My UD2 i5 system $550

[gregord]

GIGABYTE GA-P55M-UD2
Intel Core i5-750
G.SKILL 4GB DDR3 1600
Western Digital Caviar Blue WD5000AAKS 500GB
Sony Optiarc 24X DVD/CD Rewritable Drive Black SATA Model AD-7240S-0B
Cheapo Rosewill ATX mid tower and 530W power supply

Total= $550

I bought 2 NEC EA231wmi 23inch IPS displays. Arrange them in portrait mode side by side for a 2160x1920 display. IMHO more practical than a 27inch iMac in wide format. The 1920 of vertical pixel goodness is awesome.

My total for this rig was just over $1200 including shipping costs. For that I have a mac equivalent to the 27" i5 iMac with more total screen pixels in an arrangement optimized for coding. Saving around a thousand dollars is quite satisfying and this is a great upgrade from my previous mac, a mac mini.

If anyone is curious about the NEC EA231wmi as a great display compliment to your builds, I can answer questions.

 

[Demerdland]

Does the firewire work on the UD2 rig with Tony's DSDT?
(I mean, really work as in external harddrives mount and unmount correctly) ??

 

[gregord]

Does the firewire work on the UD2 rig with Tony's DSDT?
(I mean, really work as in external harddrives mount and unmount correctly) ??

I don't know as I do not have any firewire devices to test with.

 

[tonymacx86]

Does the firewire work on the UD2 rig with Tony's DSDT?
(I mean, really work as in external harddrives mount and unmount correctly) ??

I can confirm that Firewire works for me- I even used Target disk mode from my Powerbook to pull files to the UD2.

 

[Yoyellow]

both the firewire fromt eh backpanel, and teh one on the front (well teh pins on the board) work on my hack, means i havve 2 working firewire ports

 

[ninetto]

Hi, firstly thanks for the great site all 'round!

Just when you think you know it all - I've done 6 differnet Hackintosh builds on desktops and laptops... Intel comes around with a new processor, damn!

Sooo, before I invest more sweat and moolah in a system similiar to yours, two questions:
1) has anyone installed 10.5 (not snow leopard) on the UD2
2) How stable are your UD2 builds, what quirks (sound?) have come up?

The reason for wanting to go 10.5 first, is to avoid other 3rd party software nightmares. Not all software I use may play ball with SL...

thanks for the advice and
best, ninetto

 

[chace90]

both the firewire fromt eh backpanel, and teh one on the front (well teh pins on the board) work on my hack, means i havve 2 working firewire ports

How about the esata port? anyone tried that?

 

[gregord]

Sooo, before I invest more sweat and moolah in a system similiar to yours, two questions:
1) has anyone installed 10.5 (not snow leopard) on the UD2
2) How stable are your UD2 builds, what quirks (sound?) have come up?

Have not tried 10.5 myself but I imagine it would work well. My quirks are mostly usb related. Top 2 ports do not allow resume from sleep, and I had my keyboard stop working once even though it was plugged into a "good" port.

 

[gregord]

both the firewire fromt eh backpanel, and teh one on the front (well teh pins on the board) work on my hack, means i havve 2 working firewire ports

How about the esata port? anyone tried that?

Have not tried esata port.