[SUCCESS] The Girlfriend Build GA-B85-HD3 i3-4330 8GB RAM GeForce 8400GS

[jarotte]

jarotte's Girlfriend Build: Core i3-4330 - GA-B85-HD3 - 8GB RAM - 8400GS

Components

GIGABYTE GA-B85-HD3 LGA 1150 Intel ATX Motherboard
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00E36XNQ0

Intel Core i3-4330 Haswell 3.5GHz LGA 1150 Dual-Core Processor Model BX80646I34330
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00EUUN76U

Kingston HyperX Blu DDR3 2x4096MB 1600MHz CL9 Intel XMP BOX
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B0037TO5C0/

SAMSUNG 840 EVO MZ-7TE120BW (2.5", 120GB, SATA/600)
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00E3W15P0

TP-LINK TL-WDN4800 Dual Band Wireless N900 PCI Express Adapter,2.4GHz 450Mbps/5Ghz 450Mbps
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B007GMPZ0A


Already Owned

Apple Mac OS X 10.9 Mavericks @ Mac App Store
https://itunes.apple.com/pl/app/os-x-mavericks/id675248567?mt=12

Seagate Barracuda 500 GB HDD SATA 6 Gb/s NCQ 16MB Cache 3.5-Inch Internal Bare Drive
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B005CT56R6/

BENQ 19" G900WAD
It's so old even the BENQ website doesn't list it.

Cooler Master Elite 311 Case
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B005SEYJCS/

Logitech K260 Wireless Mouse + Keyboard Combo
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B004KSQANO/

TP-LINK TL-WN751ND Wireless N150 PCI Adapter, 2.4GHz 150Mbps
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B005FUGPP4/

Palit GeForce 8400GS


Comments:

After my girlfriend's Win7 PC started to experience recurring reboots, I started to think that an upgrade was in order and began to look around for new hardware. Perusal of the most recent Buyer's Guide yielded two results: Z87M-D3H and a Haswell CPU, either an i3 4330 or a i5 4430. Both CPUs have Intel's HD4600 and before we settled on a dedicated GPU, I wanted the Intel chipset to drive the graphics for the build. However, as pricing was an important factor in the purchase, I decided to go through with the i3 4330 and a different motherboard: Gigabyte's GA-B85-HD3. It's not listed in the Buyer's Guide, but a quick look at the forum demonstrated that at least one person managed to build a successful system on this motherboard.

Another goal for the build was to purchase only the essential hardware, that is motherboard+CPU, new RAM, and an SSD. The rest stayed on from the Win7 setup.

After cleaning out the Elite 311 case, I installed the new hardware and took it for a spin. I have some prior experience building hackintoshes -- my primary work machine is a Z68X-UD3H-B3 i5-2500K 10.9.2 build -- so the install process was a breeze.

I followed the recommended settings for Mavericks installs: Set BIOS to Optimized Defaults and XMP Memory Profile to Profile1. Even though the Palit 8400GS card was already installed, I changed the InitDisplayFirst setting in the BIOS to use the Intel HD4600 chipset as the primary (IGFX).

One other caveat: the installation won't work on a monitor hooked up to a VGA connection, it has to be connected via DVI to reach the installer screen. The rest of the installation process followed tonymac's 10.9 Installation Guide.

Multibeast settings for OSX Mavericks

The GraphicsEnabler option was added to enable the 8400GS GPU. After the installation was done, I switched the InitDisplayFirst setting back to PCI, and the 8400GS won't work without the GE set to "Yes".

Even though I read that there will be trouble with getting the TP-Link WN751ND card working under OSX, I decided to give it a try. After some fun with kexts for the card's chipset, I managed to connect it to my home router but it kept freezing after connecting. Shortly thereafter, I ordered the recommended WDN4800 card and hooked the machine up with an Ethernet cable.

The Ethernet works with the kext from the image above, but it's wonky as hell and won't get past 10Mbit/s speeds. That's probably why the board isn't included in the Buyer's Guide.

After the WDN4800 came in the mail, I installed it and it worked fully OOB, no problems with connections or initialization.

What works:

• sleep/wake
• USB 2.0
• App Store, iCloud
• iMessage:

after the initial login prompt, it accepted the AppleID and gave me the selection screen to choose addresses/phone number at which I'd be available. Fully confident that it works OOB I tried sending myself a few messages. Nothing happened, so I peeked into the preferences and was greeted with (inactive) next to iMessage. I had trouble with iMessage before and solved it with FileNVRAM.dylib so I copied the file from my other hack, changed the Device Order in System Preferences->Network to put Ethernet first and rebooted. After the reboot, iMessage greeted me with another error -- "iMessage cannot be set up with this Apple ID at this time." However, that issue was solved by adding a credit card to the AID. After adding the wireless card, I had to change the Device Order again so that Wi-Fi is on top, otherwise iMessage would not send messages.​

Not tested:

• USB 3.0
• FaceTime (no webcam), although there were no login issues.

10.9.2 Update:
My OS X USB is still at 10.9, so I downloaded the Combo Update and ran it with no problems. Repatched the audio with MultiBeast after the upgrade to get it to work.


The graphics is a bit laggy (the other hack in our household is powered by a 6870 Radeon, so we have a comparison), but the build runs perfectly otherwise.

After I completed the installation, I hooked up the HDD with Win7 and there's no problems with booting either of the systems from Chimera.

Geekbench 2.2.6 score:

 

[Misscomp]

Dear Jarotte,

I noticed you got a ati 6850 card running on your other primary computer. Is it hard to get the card to run on Mavericks? How about the 6870? Do you think this card will be hard to install with Mavericks?

Thanks.

 

[jarotte]

No problems with 6870 in Mavericks, recognized as HD 6xxx, fully working. didn't even have to take it out to install Mavericks on IGFX, like I had to with 10.8.

 

[jarotte]

upgraded the rig to 10.9.3, repatched audio and TRIM, the process went off without a hitch.

also switched the SMBios to iMac14,1, still works smoothly.

 

[CMMdavy]

Hi jarotte,

I am currently in the process of doing my first build and have the same motherboard and processor as you but when I get to the Mavericks install screen the system freezes before the langue selection.

I am by no means a great "techie" so I am sure I am made errors in the BIOS settings. So would you be abel to assist me in getting the correct BIOS settings? The best would be if you could give me the screen shots so I know i have made the correct settings.

And if you have any other advice it would be welcome.

Thanks in advance.

 

[CMMdavy]

Just some more information i created the boot disk as per the user manual and then started with the BIOS.

The BIOS changes i made are as follows:
1. Boot priorities to USB
2. Boot option I have tried both SATA and Legacy, none seem to work. How do I know which one to Use, i believe that this should never be set to UEFI.
3. xHCI set to Auto
4. xHCI had off/EHCI hand off set to enabled.

The other setting where left as defaulted.

But the system still freezes when i use the HDMI display on the login screen before the language selection. I have tried using the -x method and that does the same.

Have i missed anything?

But the best will be if I can get screenshots of the BIOS settings.

Thanks.

 

[jarotte]

I will try to supply you with the screenshots in a bit, but I went the recommended way --
loaded Optimized Defaults, set Extreme Memory Profile (X.M.P.) to Profile1 and set up the SSD to be the default boot drive, given that I would be loading up the contents of the USB via F12/Boot Selection. I don't mess with VT-d, because our CPU doesn't support it, so it's off by default.

Try to hook up your display via DVI, when I first started building this rig I hooked it up via VGA and it wouldn't pass the boot process, hanging on the BluetoothHCIController or something BT-related, can't remember it all well now.

 

[CMMdavy]

Hi Thanks, the screenshots will help.

How do i load the optimised defaults?

My monitor does not have a DVI connector so I am using the HDMI connector, so not using the VGA connector should this be ok?

 

[jarotte]

As you can see from the screenshots below, pressing F7 while in the utility will load Optimized Defaults.

Here are the screenshots:







And an album for convenience: [LINK]

This is as clear as it gets. Sorry if this sounds patronizing, but if it still isn't all that understandable, maybe you shouldn't be messing with building a custom rig to run osx86 in the first place.

 

[CMMdavy]

Thank you. Will let you know of the outcome.