How long life time will a hackintosh have?

[Threepwood]

Seven years ago unibody Macbooks came to stores, and I instantly bought one. For price of 1100 €, it was an amazingly good purchase. Three years ago I installed a SSD drive, and I'm still using my old good Macbook.

Now I think it's finally time to buy a new computer. I have an iPad, so I don't need laptop anymore. (I use my Macbook as a desktop, with external keyboard, mouse and screen.) Unfortunately, Mac Minis seem to be outdated, and the cheapest iMac with SSD costs more than 2300 €, which is ridiculous (and that's even without retina!)

So, if I build a new "Mac Mini Deluxe", following strictly Tonymacx86's suggestions, how long lifetime is my new hackintosh likely to have? Is it possible to use it 5-8 years without severe problems?

How often will I have problems that will need fixing and spending hours in Google and forums? Every week/month/year or never? I know something about computers, but definitely I'm not any kind of nerd.

To put my guestion in other words: I'm planning to use my next computer for 5-8 years. Is it sensible to build a hackintosh, or should I buy a genuine Mac, because it'll "pay itself back" during following years?

 

[Going Bald]

I built my X58A back in 2009-2010 time frame. It has given good service and is still going strong. So longevity is not a problem - it will last as long as the hardware lasts. The nice thing about a PC-Mac is the ability to add extra drives and change out GPUs as you upgrade to the next version of OS X. Or you could just stay with the first version you successfully installed. Or you can keep a HDD/SSD of each version if you have some apps that are not updated to the latest and you need to revert to run your app. The last is what I have done. I have a HDD for 10.6.8, 10.7.5, 10.8.5, 10.9.5, 10.10.5 and will shortly be installing 10.11

 

[pilotmac]

If you follow the guide (select the proper hardware and config your bios properly) you should not encounter any problem.

And if you do, you'll have to visit this forum and do some google searches to get started, but once everything is up and running perfectly it will be incredibly rewarding and awesome.
It'll last forever cause you can upgrade cpu, gpu, ram and ssd the way you like it.
It will be as if you had a real mac.
Also, you will save a quite substantial amount of cash.

Built my hack some years ago and absolutly don't regret it.

No "severe problem" will come from nowhere with a working system.
It will be stable for years to come.

Issues might arise when installing a new version of OS X, or upgrading so once again you'll have to follow the instructions and back up frequently to ensure you do not lose anything.
For instance I have some issues with 10.11 right now, but I know I'll figure it out soon.

Good luck on your build

 

[nobodynose]

Seven years ago unibody Macbooks came to stores, and I instantly bought one. For price of 1100 €, it was an amazingly good purchase. Three years ago I installed a SSD drive, and I'm still using my old good Macbook.

Now I think it's finally time to buy a new computer. I have an iPad, so I don't need laptop anymore. (I use my Macbook as a desktop, with external keyboard, mouse and screen.) Unfortunately, Mac Minis seem to be outdated, and the cheapest iMac with SSD costs more than 2300 €, which is ridiculous (and that's even without retina!)

So, if I build a new "Mac Mini Deluxe", following strictly Tonymacx86's suggestions, how long lifetime is my new hackintosh likely to have? Is it possible to use it 5-8 years without severe problems?

How often will I have problems that will need fixing and spending hours in Google and forums? Every week/month/year or never? I know something about computers, but definitely I'm not any kind of nerd.

To put my guestion in other words: I'm planning to use my next computer for 5-8 years. Is it sensible to build a hackintosh, or should I buy a genuine Mac, because it'll "pay itself back" during following years?

I first built my hackintosh in early 2012. It was based on a Gigabyte GA-Z68MA-D2H-B3 motherboard with a Sandy Bridge i3 CPU and an NVidia 9500GT graphics card. Subsequently I upgraded it to a Sandy Bridge i5 and an NVidia GT640 graphics card and then most recently I upgraded to Haswell, with an MSI H97M-G43 motherboard, i5-4590S CPU, and an NVidia GTX750 graphics card. Through all of this my system has been relatively stable**, reliable, and handles anything I throw at it. I have never reinstalled the OS on it from scratch, going from Lion to Mountain Lion to Mavericks to Yosemite, and now to El Capitan.

Sure, I've put a lot of time in doing research, tweaking my configuration, etc., but for the most part it Just Works™. Besides, I'm a tinkerer, I enjoy that type of thing.

Hope this helps!


**Stable as compared to my old MacBook Pro I used to have, which crashed, locked up, etc. all the time.

 

[jpolk1]

Your Hackintosh will last you as long as you want. I built mine 3 years ago and I love it! The only problem is it can be a pain to get it to work the first time you install the OS. After that it is smooth sailing. If you want to use Clover as your boot loader find a confirmed working Clover build with the config file!!!! I was only able to get Clover running Successful for 3 days but when I tried to fix my audio and edit some system files my build broke. I then had to revert back to Unibeast/Multibeast boot loader. I have probably spent of a months worth of hours trying to get clover to work over the past 2 years.

*** I love my build but if you want a hassle free Mac and able to install beta OS X easily a hackintoish probably isn't for you.

 

[Threepwood]

Thank you for your answers! I am amazed how many people here are willing to use their valuable time to help me!

I'm not worried about the time needed to get OS X working. I can use several evenings to struggle with that. But after everything is working, I wouldn't like to have problems with my computer in a monthly basis.

I think I may give hackintosh a try. If I will get too frustrated with OS X, I can use Windows 10 (which can make me even more frustrated...) or sell the machine and buy a genuine Mac.

Even so, I'll wait a month or two to see if Apple will update it's models this year. I am however quite skeptical about the price-quality-ratio Apple can offer in a desktop, but let's see!

So I'm likely to come back here in November to bother you with my questions!

 

[Quesenek]

I like you have the genuine apple stability in the back of my mind, but then I look at the offerings versus what can be done with hackintosh and I cannot justify the prices for the hardware given, they are however closing the price gap with the mac pro but for the every day consumer that doesn't need the rendering power that the mac pro and its GPU's give your left with the Imac which like the mac pro you cannot upgrade.

I was skeptical about how reliable a hackintosh could really be but with my recent adventures with clover I can honestly say I will probably never buy a real desktop mac., the high end macbook pro seems to be a good deal for the price because it comes with a good dedicated GPU and retina display.

If I were you I would at least try the hackintosh for a bit before going with a real mac simply because a ton can change hardware wise in 5-8 years and if you have the hackintosh you can upgrade just the pieces you need and you don't have to go out and spend the money for an entirely new PC.

 

[jpolk1]

I have to tell you one of the reasons I chose to build a Hackintoish was its price difference between an actual iMac and the idea that I could upgrade it. To be completely honest I haven't upgraded my hackintoish in the past 3 years I have had it. So the upgrading isn't relevant for me . The price difference is huge between a Hackintoish and an iMac with relatively the same specs. If you want the Apple brand on your case, take the sticker from your iPhone and slap it on there.... this isn't my build but you get the idea. (Credit to John Paul Parrot)

Stability:
I have found that Unibeast and Multibeast are very reliable!! I have only had a couple issues with the sound and internet but I have figured out that it is my motherboard, due to it having the same issues on the Windows side of my hackintoish. If you want to use Clover which is highly suggested due to on-the-fly kernel patching, it takes a lot of patience and time to set it up. Though it is suppose to give you a more genuine Mac OS X experience than Multibeast/Unibeast.

 

[kennywu]

Thank you for your answers! I am amazed how many people here are willing to use their valuable time to help me!

I'm not worried about the time needed to get OS X working. I can use several evenings to struggle with that. But after everything is working, I wouldn't like to have problems with my computer in a monthly basis.

I think I may give hackintosh a try. If I will get too frustrated with OS X, I can use Windows 10 (which can make me even more frustrated...) or sell the machine and buy a genuine Mac.

Even so, I'll wait a month or two to see if Apple will update it's models this year. I am however quite skeptical about the price-quality-ratio Apple can offer in a desktop, but let's see!

So I'm likely to come back here in November to bother you with my questions!

I welcome you to the hackintosh world! I still remember my first hackitnosh was a small ASUS netbook 1005ha-h. It was a real struggle back then to try to get 10.5.x it to work 100%. These days, with the support you get from forums, it is very easy to find solutions to problems, especially with desktop systems.

Yes, it can be frustrating at times. But the more you learn by participating in the forums, the more you will understand how your particular hardware behaves. You first hack is always your hardest. It gets exponentially easier after you've mastered your first hack.

Given time and patience, you can obtain a 100% working system, but you gotta know your hardware inside out. If you don't know what hardware you've got on board, you can't fix the problem period. So research, research research!

The beauty of desktop systems, is you can always try new hacks and OS updates on separate HDD/SSDs without affecting your main boot drive. So use this advantage to experiment with new hacks. This is an area that hacktinsoh excels vs. a closed-up mac. You can downgrade a system by booting back to your original drive if a hack fails or if you don't like the shiney new OS update.

To the surprise of many new hackintoshers, getting your hardware to boot is always the easy part. You will likely find yourself spending more time ironing out your system quirks than to get OS X to boot. Take your time, and don't throw in the towel early. It is not a 'few evenings' kinda job. The research will take up a lot of time also.

Given time and patience, you can obtain a 100% working system. Hell, its easier for me to install Mac OS X these days than fiddle around with Windows activation after any hardware changes.

As for how long a Hack can last. I've had mine since 2014. It still kills benchmarks vs. the best mac money can buy. It can outlive your Macbook pro easy. And when u need to upgrade the GPU or drives, u can do so without throwing away the other parts that are still good. i.e. your CPU which don't get much better year on year these days.

Bottom line, it is so worth it to get a Hackitnosh! It will probably outlive real Macs.

 

[PaladineUK]

Thank you for your answers! I am amazed how many people here are willing to use their valuable time to help me!

I'm not worried about the time needed to get OS X working. I can use several evenings to struggle with that. But after everything is working, I wouldn't like to have problems with my computer in a monthly basis.

I think I may give hackintosh a try. If I will get too frustrated with OS X, I can use Windows 10 (which can make me even more frustrated...) or sell the machine and buy a genuine Mac.

Even so, I'll wait a month or two to see if Apple will update it's models this year. I am however quite skeptical about the price-quality-ratio Apple can offer in a desktop, but let's see!

So I'm likely to come back here in November to bother you with my questions!

I have been building systems for over 20 years and apart from a few early machines they have all been AMD. However, I was very lucky to have a client of mine donate me a MacBook Pro last christmas and had previously purchased my first iPhone (6S Plus) after Apple moved squarely into the business of protecting their customers' privacy (I work in Privacy and Data Protection so this is very important to me).

The first couple of months of using iOS and OS X was enough to convince me to rip out the AMD 8320 from my desktop and replace it with the Skylake i7 6700k. It took me about 2 hours to get a working OS X El Capitan installation finished and I have not looked back.

Sure it is not perfect - I can't let it sleep (but I turn my system off at the end of the day anyway) and I can't seem to get DP/HDMI Audio working - but the system works and works well. I have sound via the Line Out instead of the HDMI/DP so that is not really a significant issue for me.

System seems rock solid, fast as ... well something very fast - and I no longer have to check every single bloody update to make sure Microsoft are not installing yet more spyware.

I think the October event will see new MacBook Pro, Mac Mini and possibly iMac and I will probably buy the new MacBook Pro - but it won't replace my desktop I love this beast.