[SUCCESS] Gigabyte Designare Z390 (Thunderbolt 3) + i7-9700K + AMD RX 580

[skittlebrau]

Can you describe my the sound problem that you have ?
Because for me, in firewire or thunderbolt, I hear the system same by doing anything, it's like if the sound follow the activity of the computer and it's only start during the boot when the bar is at 3/4.
In jack I don't have any problem.
Is that the same for you ?

I ended up not using USB audio anymore and just use digital/TOSLink optical as my DAC offers both. The 'clicking' noise would only occur during audio playback, either from YouTube videos or iTunes music. I haven't tried it recently though, so I'll give USB audio another go.

What you're describing sounds like a different problem. Often what you've described is caused by poor shielding on cables, loose connections or electromagnetic interference (EMI) whether internally in your chassis or your DAC. What devices are in your audio 'chain' of products?

 

[pianistslogic]

Yeah I know, it was just at the last result, effectively some people have a problem with sound, but don't understand what they exactly hear, me it's from the boot moment, at 3/4 of the bar, when it's gpu loading time, I start to hear sounds same if I don't do anything, anyway my friend take holidays and come back in September so we will see, I will continue to discuss here.


Hello @skittlebrau,

Can you describe my the sound problem that you have ?
Because for me, in firewire or thunderbolt, I hear the system same by doing anything, it's like if the sound follow the activity of the computer and it's only start during the boot when the bar is at 3/4.
In jack I don't have any problem.
Is that the same for you ?

Was facing some similar issues a while back. Balanced cables, anti noise power plugs, etc, tried a lot, no help.
What solved it for me: plugging just my two speakers/monitors into a distinct (ungrounded) wall outlet. Ever since I hear virtually no buzz/humm/hiss anymore.

 

[jrebergen]

• The case fans are all running at 100%. Probably the most minor issue. It's not like they're super loud, it's just something I noticed.

Like @CaseySJ says, the fans can easily be controlled by the BIOS. My Hack has only Noctua's:
Here are my settings:

• Fan speed control: Manual
• Fan control use temp input: CPU (for the CPU fan and top fan, the front and rear case fans are set to System 1. Still like to know were the other sensors are and how they are called)
• Temp interval: 1
• CPU fan control mode: PWM (Noctua's are 4 pin and so PWN controlled)
• CPU fan stop: Disabled

1: 30º 20%
2: 40º 30%
3: 50º 50%
4: 60º 70%
5: 70º 100%

My CPU hovers in idle between 30º and 40º, so the fans run at 30% most of the time. If this is stable I will try to push the 20% to 40º. Than the system will be at its most quit.

 

[Westsurf]

Handing over an EFI folder has the effect of turning it into a black box. You’ll not know how it was configured or why. And the instant something breaks, you’ll start sweating because you will not have qualified yourself to be your own first line of defense.

A Hackintosh comes with no warranty, no tech support, no promises. The build guide contains a lot of screenshots — it’s mostly an illustrated walkthrough with some commentary at each step. It doesn’t take long and the time you invest can pay dividends in the future. If you’re only thinking about the immediate short term with no regard for the long term, then I cannot help you.

I think I’m up to page 400 odd, after a long night of reading, and I cannot agree with this statement enough.

 

[CaseySJ]

Haha! The USB - C to DP cable was the fix... Didn't have to try anything different! Time to work on post installation.

Will report back with details!

Awesome! Hope the post installation is less eventful.

 

[CaseySJ]

Hi all,

I just built my first Hackintosh using this fantastic guide. Thank you very much, CaseySJ!!! I'm a long-time Linux geek & sysadmin so nothing was too scary for me.

Everything was working great, so I restored data from a Time Machine backup of my old 2011 iMac using Migration Assistant. That all worked great, except now I can't auto-boot into macOS anymore.

The Boot macOS Install from <Mac Volume> entry came back (as if I'm doing the first couple phases of the Hackintosh install) and it's the default entry. The Boot macOS from <Mac Volume> entry is still there, but I have to select it manually. If I let the ...Install... entry auto-boot it immediately produces a not permitted icon on screen (circle with diagonal line). I've tried specifying the default boot volume in the Clover config by name, volume UUID, disk UUID and LastBootedVolume, but nothing seems to have an effect.

Do you all have any idea why that entry showed up after restoring data via Migration Assistant and what I can do to get rid of it or at least make the non-Install entry be the default?

Thanks in advance for any help!

-Jason

Hello Jason,

Let me see if I understand this correctly:

• You are trying to set “Boot macOS from Mojave” as the default option in Clover, but it keeps reverting to “Boot MacOS Install from Mojave”?
• When you manually select “Boot MacOS from Mojave”, does the system boot up properly and let you log in?
• If so, try System Preferences —> Software Update and see if the 10.14.6 supplemental update is available. If it is, go ahead and perform that update. This will kill two birds with one stone (although we should not kill birds): it will remove the extraneous boot option in Clover and update the system.
• If your system is already up to date, it may be possible to remove the MacOS install option via “diskutil” with Terminal. The install option is an APFS volume in the same Container as the primary boot volume and the Recovery volume. APFS volumes inside a Container can be deleted, but we should be very careful with this.

 

[WilliamHarp]

Awesome! Hope the post installation is less eventful.

I can't believe it was just the DP cable... I was going mad trying a trillion different EFI configs lol.

Post installation went smooth and now its working! Getting just under 39000 in geek bench.

I can confirm TB3 hot plug capabilities are working on this board and that the TB3 bus powered Apollo Arrow audio interface is working as well(Best TB3 audio interface, imo!)

Additionally, for future those installing in the future - the Mojave installer I downloaded from the App Store (just days ago) actually installed 10.14.5 and not .6 - Check your version of your downloader to have a better idea of what you're installing

14.5.02 is a 10.14.5 installer
14.6.02 is a 10.14.6 installer
etc.

Hope this helps someone!

 

[dadest]

Wanted to ask about motherboard coil whine – my z390 Designare makes significant noise. I read setting CPU C-state may help... Does anyone have experience with that?

 

[FriFlo]

Ok! Since the 128GB kit doesn’t work in any way I have tried, I decided to first get the system fully working with the 64GB kit and maybe try the 128GB kit later.

I have made it until “finishing up” (not having done any of the “extra mile” things yet) and so far, everything seems to work. I have no camera and microphone connected yet, so I cannot check FaceTime and a few other things, but hand-off works! Big thanks to CaseySJ for writing this guide, as I really just followed instructions and would have never accomplished everything without this help.

However, I have encountered some inconsistencies during the post-installation, which I am not sure what to make of. I totally realize, that I will have to dig deeper into understanding these things myself and be able to do some trial and error testing after having done a back up of a working system! For the moment, I would however appreciate some help in understanding what is what. This is what I do not get:

1) “About this Mac” shows me that there are 128GB of RAM installed, although that is physically impossible on this motherboard, which only offers 4 slots … and this, of course, is with the 64GB kit installed.

2) I had (and still have) quite a lot of USB ports missing. I am not sure if this might be due to me using a different PC case (Lian-Li o11 Dynamic). All USB ports on the motherboard and the case do work, however. Not sure, if there is something to be done about that.

3) Audio devices: I can see everything but HDMI, but I am using a DVI cable and I suppose it would show up with a proper cable/monitor connected to the Hackintosh, would it?

4) Audio over headphone Jack sounds funny (very compressed, with the quiet bit getting pulled up in volume quite a lot). I will use a professional PCIe or USB interface, anyway (RME), so this is not really important, but if there is an easy fix to it, I might fix it.

5) I cannot see any VRAM. On the IGPU

Thanks for your patience! I am trying to catch up with understanding more myself!

 

[CaseySJ]

Let's tackle each of these questions:

...

1) “About this Mac” shows me that there are 128GB of RAM installed, although that is physically impossible on this motherboard, which only offers 4 slots … and this, of course, is with the 64GB kit installed.

View attachment 420649

I wonder if this is due to SMBIOS name. Are you using iMac19,1 or something else? Also good to double-check BIOS version is still F6 or F7.

2) I had (and still have) quite a lot of USB ports missing. I am not sure if this might be due to me using a different PC case (Lian-Li o11 Dynamic). All USB ports on the motherboard and the case do work, however. Not sure, if there is something to be done about that.

View attachment 420650
View attachment 420651

This is 100% correct. MacOS limits us to 15 USB ports per controller. Your screenshot shows 15 active ports.

3) Audio devices: I can see everything but HDMI, but I am using a DVI cable and I suppose it would show up with a proper cable/monitor connected to the Hackintosh, would it?

Quite possibly. We have seen very consistent results with HDMI audio.

4) Audio over headphone Jack sounds funny (very compressed, with the quiet bit getting pulled up in volume quite a lot). I will use a professional PCIe or USB interface, anyway (RME), so this is not really important, but if there is an easy fix to it, I might fix it.

The rear green audio jack produces excellent sound quality in my experience. But the front-panel audio jack (on the ATX case) tends to be pretty awful unless the case manufacturer is using good quality audio connectors and cables.

5) I cannot see any VRAM. On the IGPU

View attachment 420652

Thanks for your patience! I am trying to catch up with understanding more myself!

VRAM for iGPU is shown in the screenshot (1536 MB). Eventually, it's recommended to switch to headless platform ID 0x3E980003 otherwise various A/V apps such as iMovie and Final Cut Pro will crash. The IGPU will no longer be shown in Graphics/Displays, but can be verified from IORegistryExplorer.