[OSx86] My first working OSX86 build!

[Chicane-UK Veteran]

I've been having thoughts about trying a Hackintosh build for quite a while.. and whilst I think my previous motherboard could have worked with some effort, to be honest I couldn't really get my head around DSDT's and all the other tweaks to make it work.

I decided the best thing would be to buy more compatible hardware so after a bit of research swapped out my existing setup for a Gigabyte GA-Z77-DS3H.. not only is it very compatible with Mountain Lion, it's also quite well priced and more than suits my needs. It was also a convenient time to move up from a Core 2 Quad to a Core i5 CPU..

I just spent the evening deploying Mountain Lion using the Unibeast / Multibeast method and couldn't be happier. Only had to do minimal tweaking (setting PCIRootUID=0 to actually get the installer up) and everything seems to be working as far as I can tell - though I haven't tried sleep / suspend or anything like that yet. Sound / LAN / video all seem fine.

I've done the build on a spare harddrive I had lying around - next need to experiment on deploying it to my normal boot drive and setting up Chameleon to boot Windows too... as I still want to play Battlefield 3! :)

[Scorbing]

Congrats!

[RottGutt]

Gratz! I have been considering building a hackintosh for a while now. I currently have a late-2010 21.5" iMac, and want to upgrade. I checked out the latest tonymacosx "build" guide, and see that I can get a much more powerful unit going this way than buying a new iMac. In fact, I can build one much better than the upgraded iMac versions for 1/3 to 1/2 the price of said iMac. I guess the biggest question I have is, "will I be able to Boot Camp a hackintosh to run Windows? In my profession, I need access to both systems, in fact, I need Windows a little more than OS X. Have you tried Boot Camp yet on your build?

Tim

[Chicane-UK Veteran]

No - and I'm not sure that I would. As part of the Multibeast installation, you install a 3rd party bootloader called Chameleon which can handle other operating systems.. so it's that I plan to use as and when I try and get a dual boot system working.

I only ended up making a Hackintosh because Apple don't really make a system that appeals to me that costs anything remotely reasonable. I like the Mac Pro but it's not only hugely expensive but desperate for a hardware refresh.. and I'd like to have the option to upgrade bits and pieces in the system incrementally which rules out systems like the iMac. It's annoying :( I actually used to have an iMac a few years ago but again it was starting to get on a little bit and the graphics card really was not good enough.. I was able to sell and use the proceeds to pay for basically a brand new PC build that was quicker in every way. Of course barely any PC has as nice an enclosure / case as most Macs but that's the tradeoff I guess.

I can heartily reccommend the motherboard I got though - it's referenced in a lot of guides, and seems to run brilliantly in both Windows and OSX :) I think on reflection though an ATI based video card might be a better bet than an nVidia.

[Chicane-UK Veteran]

Well much to my surprise, even sleep seems to work just fine - which I didn't expect. I can't recommend this motherboard enough if you want to make a Hackintosh.

Now my only annoyance is my sound card - I have an Asus Xonar Essence STX which I bought because of the dedicated headphone amp on it. I love how it sounds but obviously it's completely unsupported in Mountain Lion so each time I decide to boot OSX, I have to shutdown, remove my soundcard, and enable the onboard soundcard - which sounds nowhere near as good.

I guess the only realistic solution is to ditch the Xonar and buy a USB DAC / headphone amplifier of some kind?

[tim_s]

Amazing,

Unfortunately I have an iMac, was a gift for my home office and is getting outdated fast. I have not had the "want" to upgrade it, where-as, my Windows 7 / Linux machines are quite easy to upgrade as I go along.

A "Hackintosh" would solve this problem and on some level would be more realistic to my target audience if I could keep it running but I am not quite clear on Apples stance on this.

[guitmz]

nice to hear that! if you have any questions, feel free to PM me about hackintosh... im doing this since tiger, so i kinda been through a lot of situations you guys may also face :)

[Chicane-UK Veteran]

Amazing,

Unfortunately I have an iMac, was a gift for my home office and is getting outdated fast. I have not had the "want" to upgrade it, where-as, my Windows 7 / Linux machines are quite easy to upgrade as I go along.

A "Hackintosh" would solve this problem and on some level would be more realistic to my target audience if I could keep it running but I am not quite clear on Apples stance on this.

Sadly I think it's pretty clear - it's against their terms of use for the product. But I don't see how it matters provided you actually buy a copy and then tinker with it however you want.. you're not going to be reverse engineering it, making money from it, trying to go to them for support, etc and I'd imagine from a legal point of view they have bigger fish to fry than chasing down random individuals on the internet who are trying to run their operating system.

Provided buying a copy keeps your conscience clear, then I say do what makes you happy.

[+Nik Louch Subscriber²]

I built one a few years back, but it was Snow Leopard back then. I wanted to stay up-to-date and it seemed way too much hassle so I figured I'd have to just buy a Mac soon...

[briangw]

Anyone run one on a laptop? I have a Core i7 MSI gaming laptop and would be interested to know if it would install, let alone run well.

[tim_s]

Sadly I think it's pretty clear - it's against their terms of use for the product. But I don't see how it matters provided you actually buy a copy and then tinker with it however you want.. you're not going to be reverse engineering it, making money from it, trying to go to them for support, etc and I'd imagine from a legal point of view they have bigger fish to fry than chasing down random individuals on the internet who are trying to run their operating system.

Provided buying a copy keeps your conscience clear, then I say do what makes you happy.

I enjoy using my Mac Book Pro but to be fair I think I will stick with Linux as my desktop. Sounds more simple and they are about the same in terms of capability in the perspective of how I am using the devices.

[threetonesun]

Good luck! I had one once upon a time, but trying to update it was quite a painful experience. To be honest, I don't see much of a reason for building one now, since Apple barely even releases new GPU drivers for it's own systems... even if you do get it running, the one bright spot of a Hackintosh (aside from the price) ends up being a no show.

[allannyholm]

I'm also on a Hackintosh using the same motherboard. I had to tinker some with Chameleon Wizard - removing the darkwake preference in order to let my machine sleep.

[Chicane-UK Veteran]

Also have this dual booting perfectly, off the same 128GB SSD, as my Windows 7 installation. I took a bit of time reading through various guides which involved getting stuck into some truely horrid partition editing, etc but in the end it was as simple as:

* Load Unibeast based MountainLion installer - make disk a GPT type disk rather than MBR, and split into two partitions - partition one was an HFS+ OSX partition and the other (as a placeholder) a FAT partition. Install MountainLion.

* Reboot and install Windows 7 - when choosing the partition select the FAT, which it'll moan about, and format it as NTFS instead. Finish the install and setup all the drivers if necessary.

* Reboot back into OSX and run through the Multibeast installer, including installing the Chameleon bootloader.

* Reboot again and marvel as your Chameleon bootloader gives you the choice of Windows os OSX disks to boot off.

I think I've reached home computing nirvana.. I now have the choice of fully functional OSX and Windows 7 on the hardware that I've chosen. Now I just have to decide if I want to cut up my Powermac G5 (2.5GHz Quad) case as an experiment in trying to put a PC in it... though I'm not quite sure I can bring myself to do that- so don't worry !! :)

[+Nik Louch Subscriber²]

Does it not bother you that you're still on Mountain Lion (no agenda, seriously just asking)?

[Chicane-UK Veteran]

Does it not bother you that you're still on Mountain Lion (no agenda, seriously just asking)?

Not sure I understand.. what else would I be using?

[Shaun N.]

Does it not bother you that you're still on Mountain Lion (no agenda, seriously just asking)?

Mountain Lion is the most current version no?

[+Nik Louch Subscriber²]

Sorry was confused. I was thinking Snow Lep. My apologies.

[Chicane-UK Veteran]

Ah ok :)

[Groovedude]

nice work! :) if you do build pc into your mac case do share some sexy pics ;)

[REM2000]

ive been meaning to do something similar myself, i do have a iMac which i love, but i would like to have a Mac with a lot more internal storage instead of relying on external drives.

[guitmz]

even tough ML is the latest, SL was the best version I've ever used of OSX (not only talking about hackintoshes).

[Shaun N.]

even tough ML is the latest, SL was the best version I've ever used of OSX (not only talking about hackintoshes).

True dat! - I formatted my Hackintosh after a couple of weeks use of ML. I didn't feel the want to use it anymore. SL was by far the better version.

[guitmz]

It's so good that they still support it. Most apps are compatible with 10.6 :)

[Chicane-UK Veteran]

Indeed. I would probably have used Snow Leopard but from what I read it just wasn't quite as easy to Hackintosh, and support for Nvidia cards is a hell of a lot more ropey.. and as I have an Nvidia GTX 560, I figured Mountain Lion was my best option!

If for whatever reason I switch to an ATI card, I'd consider giving Snow Leopard a go though.