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Cindori Custom: Building an i7 Hackintosh

Cindori said:
that image is from primatelabs themselves.
http://www.primatelabs.ca/blog/2009/03/mac-pro-benchmarks-early-2009/

they collected several benches and listed the average score. if it was 64 bit or 32 bit, doesnt say. but id say the former, since here is a score
http://browse.geekbench.ca/geekbench2/view/120728

that is in line with the one on the top of my image, and its 64bit.
Click to expand...

Might be due to the old version of Geekbench.
But check out the current benches at http://browse.geekbench.ca/geekbench2/top?page=2.
The Dual Quad 2.93GHz Pros score from over 16 to almost 18k.
The results you posted are definitely from the 32-bit version.
 
Cindori,

Does this rig suffer from the same Audio / CPU issue that is affecting the (Early 2009) Mac Pros? If not, any chance you could send me your AppleIntelCPUPowerManagement.kext file?

Thanks..
 
In short, the issue is on 2009 Mac Pros, playing music in iTunes or through a browser stream, results in increased temps on teh CPUs. In my wife's case, the temp went from an idle 35c to 59C in about 9 mins and was still climbing when I stopped the test.

My short term solution was to get smcFanControl and up the speeds just a little bit on all fans except BOOSTA which was increased to 1800 rpm. New test showed the temp did not go over 44C, which is a 15C improvement. This was over 5 songs played (about 20 mins).

Cindori said:
Im not sure what the audio/cpu issue is exactly?
Click to expand...
 
ildondeigiocchi said:
Sweet rig. :D Congrats on the system. One question... does bootcamp work with the Hackintosh... I know in theory there is no need since it starts up from bios but still can bootcamp work on a hackintosh?
Click to expand...

No - and you're correct that there's no need for it.

Boot Camp will give you an error on set-up that you need to update your firmware.

VMWare will recognize a "bare metal" bootable Windows installation on a Hackintosh as a "Boot Camp Partition" and will allow you to boot it as a VM. I run XP this way on mine in full screen mode and just use Spaces keyboard shortcuts to switch operating systems as needed.
;)

leekohler said:
Seems I'm hearing more and more about hackintosh. I wonder how many people have built them since Intel came into the picture.
Click to expand...

I'm on my 4th one now.
 
leekohler said:
Seems I'm hearing more and more about hackintosh. I wonder how many people have built them since Intel came into the picture.
Click to expand...

From all I've ever seen, quite a few people (just by looking at InsanelyMac).

smacman: why would it? Just curious, as his machine is very different from the current Mac Pro.
 
codymac said:
No - and you're correct that there's no need for it.

Boot Camp will give you an error on set-up that you need to update your firmware.

VMWare will recognize a "bare metal" bootable Windows installation on a Hackintosh as a "Boot Camp Partition" and will allow you to boot it as a VM. I run XP this way on mine in full screen mode and just use Spaces keyboard shortcuts to switch operating systems as needed.
;)



I'm on my 4th one now.
Click to expand...

And they're all pretty stable for you? No major problems?

Mackilroy said:
From all I've ever seen, quite a few people (just by looking at InsanelyMac).
Click to expand...

Yes, it would so appear.
 
If updates are as easy as using apples built in software and not having to reinstall every update, then I may have to make a serious look at this when it comes time to update my 2.8x8.

Glad to see this thread got cleaned up as well.
 
leekohler said:
And they're all pretty stable for you? No major problems?
Click to expand...

Pretty much. I've got some minor boot issues with my most recent one - a scratchbuilt Core 2 Quad. It very rarely panics on boot into Snow Leopard but hasn't done it consistently enough for me to troubleshoot it. I've got a very goofy boot config though since I'm running XP on it as well - and XP doesn't play nicely with anything else. The others all ran Leopard and were as stable as my real Macs.

Despite the above, I'm in the process of moving to it as my primary desktop at home. I built it to get me by while waiting to see what the next Mac Pro revision is going to entail. It ended up costing about what a new high spec. mini would.

The others have been rock solid although I'm down to two Hackintoshes at the moment, the most stable being being my first: a Sun Ultra 20 that I'm still using.

kellen said:
If updates are as easy as using apples built in software and not having to reinstall every update, then I may have to make a serious look at this when it comes time to update my 2.8x8.
Click to expand...

In general they are. It's wise to be a little wary of OSX point releases though as they have the potential and have been known to break things. The more "vanilla" your install and the closer to Apple hardware you are, the better off you are.
 
codymac said:
Pretty much. I've got some minor boot issues with my most recent one - a scratchbuilt Core 2 Quad. It very rarely panics on boot into Snow Leopard but hasn't done it consistently enough for me to troubleshoot it. I've got a very goofy boot config though since I'm running XP on it as well - and XP doesn't play nicely with anything else. The others all ran Leopard and were as stable as my real Macs.

Despite the above, I'm in the process of moving to it as my primary desktop at home. I built it to get me by while waiting to see what the next Mac Pro revision is going to entail. It ended up costing about what a new high spec. mini would.

The others have been rock solid although I'm down to two Hackintoshes at the moment, the most stable being being my first: a Sun Ultra 20 that I'm still using.



In general they are. It's wise to be a little wary of OSX point releases though as they have the potential and have been known to break things. The more "vanilla" your install and the closer to Apple hardware you are, the better off you are.
Click to expand...

Thanks. I will keep that in mind.
 
leekohler said:
Seems I'm hearing more and more about hackintosh. I wonder how many people have built them since Intel came into the picture.
Click to expand...

Well, since before Apple switched to x86 processors, it was essentially impossible to build a hackintosh, that would explain the fact that you've been hearing more since the switch to Intel...

(There were a few companies that made PowerPC desktops, mostly for Linux use, and I don't think any of them ever got OS X running. A few earlier ones had "Mac On Linux" running OS 9 as an app, similar to "Classic"; but I don't believe OS X ever got running on one of these machines.)
 
gianly1985 said:
It's smart but for 3200$ the Q1 2010 upcoming MP will be better...
Click to expand...

But probably not nearly better enough to justify the price. And depending on clock speeds, with apps that don't take full advantage of that many cores (Logic still only uses half of the latest high end MP), an overclocked i7 has a good shot at being faster than that $3200 machine.

And at that point, users will be using the new chips to build hackintoshes that beat that machine at a lower price.

This is a great machine...and darn similar to what I'm running. The 920 and gigabyte mobo is a killer combination. And a perfect example of how badly Apple is dropping the ball with their MP configs as compared to what they could be selling if they would make the tiniest bit of effort to address the gaping hole in their desktop lineup. The 4 core MP is an embarrassment, period.

I had $2400 burning a hole in my pocket ready to buy at the last MP refresh, and they drove me away.
 
Very very very very nice Cindori! :) one thing you forgot in the cost though was time & labor, some need a machine quick-smart :D or are just plain lazy hehe ;)
 
I'm not sure about your logic board but check around, and I can tell you my GTX 285 works fine in 10.5.8 and 10.6.2, I used the iakios v7 disk I believe and it came with the drivers just install them when you install the OS. My hackintosh has been running for month's now without a problem it just takes just trial and error to get it running 100% stable.

phaedarus said:
Do you think I'd be able to get away with an Asus Rampage II motherboard? I'm told those are OSX friendly.

What about an Nvidia GTX 275?
Click to expand...
 
I assume one could install a cheap stock Apple video card (NVIDIA GT 120?) at the beginning of the build to get the system up and running prior to advancing to something like the 4890?

Just trying to make life simple. I have built several computers, but the unfamiliar technology and terminology makes this just a tiny bit daunting.
 
as far as I know, EFI cards does not help you when you are on a PC.

the concept of 4890 was simple. when installing to the drive, toss in an enabler like ATY_Init.kext. then you can boot with 4890. when booted, put GraphicsEnabler=yes in boot.plist (my bootloader had built in enabler). now you can remove the ATY_Init.kext.
 
I've actually done something pretty similar recently. I was fed up with Apple's pricing strategy on their Mac Pro line and decided to build myself an i7 hackintosh - well, in a way I upgraded my Mac Pro.

Specs before upgrade:
2.66Ghz Dual Dual Core Intel Xeon (Woodcrest 5150)
6GB 667Mhz DDR2 ECC RAM (Dual Channel)
2 x ATI Radeon 4870 1GB XFX cards (flashed - also limited to 8xPCIe1.1)
16x Superdrive
750GB System and User data drive
500GB Backup data drive
3x1.5TB Data drives
Bluetooth + Airport Extreme

Specs after upgrade:
2.66GHz Quad Core Intel Core i7 (920 D0) running at 4.2GHz
12GB 1600MHz DDR3 RAM (Tripple Channel)
2 x ATI Radeon 4870 1GB XFX cards (now using 16xPCIe2.0)
8x LG Bluray Reader/DVD Writer (meant to order the BD-writer, whoops)
256GB Crucial M225 SSD System drive
500GB User data drive
750GB Backup data drive
3x1.5TB Data drives
Belkin Bluetooth

XBench before: 156.06
XBench after: 410.47

Even better, the simulations I have to run for work now run over twice as fast and three times as fast if I'm running eight of them thanks to Hyperthreading.

Total cost of upgrading was about £1500 although I should recoup a fair chunk of that by selling off the old Mac Pro parts. It's running incredibly well at the moment, OS X is great, Windows is great. The only issue I have is that I can't get my second 4870 to work in OS X no matter what I try. Half the time I start up, its fans are spinning like mad until I restart. I only have the second 4870 for Windows crossfire use anyway but I'd like it to work in OS X for CUDA maybe and to stop the fan from being noisy. I'll probably upgrade to a 5970 when 5xxx series drivers get added into OS X though.
 

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This is why I'm giving Apple until the next MacPro refresh to come out with a competitor.

It's getting very, very hard to justify Apple's price/performance ratio this generation.

This is a super sweet rig. Cool case, too!
 
PeterQVenkman said:
This is why I'm giving Apple until the next MacPro refresh to come out with a competitor.

It's getting very, very hard to justify Apple's price/performance ratio this generation.

This is a super sweet rig. Cool case, too!
Click to expand...

leekohler said:
Yep- I agree. Let's hope they deliver.
Click to expand...

If anyone else in the US is looking to get the Define R2 case, I've been emailing back and forth with the company and their rep said he'd get more info to me after CES. Right now it'll probably be a couple months until the first cases can get manufactured and shipped to North America from Asia, so if you want Cindori's particular case be prepared to wait for it. :)
 
Mackilroy said:
If anyone else in the US is looking to get the Define R2 case, I've been emailing back and forth with the company and their rep said he'd get more info to me after CES. Right now it'll probably be a couple months until the first cases can get manufactured and shipped to North America from Asia, so if you want Cindori's particular case be prepared to wait for it. :)
Click to expand...

Thanks for the info. :)
 
Is it possible to turn HP stations like Z600 and Z800 in to hackintosh?
If so, is there any hardware i should change prior to install OS X?

I can get really good price on those 2, however i need OS X.
 
Spanky Deluxe said:
I've actually done something pretty similar recently. I was fed up with Apple's pricing strategy on their Mac Pro line and decided to build myself an i7 hackintosh - well, in a way I upgraded my Mac Pro.

Specs before upgrade:
2.66Ghz Dual Dual Core Intel Xeon (Woodcrest 5150)
6GB 667Mhz DDR2 ECC RAM (Dual Channel)
2 x ATI Radeon 4870 1GB XFX cards (flashed - also limited to 8xPCIe1.1)
16x Superdrive
750GB System and User data drive
500GB Backup data drive
3x1.5TB Data drives
Bluetooth + Airport Extreme

Specs after upgrade:
2.66GHz Quad Core Intel Core i7 (920 D0) running at 4.2GHz
12GB 1600MHz DDR3 RAM (Tripple Channel)
2 x ATI Radeon 4870 1GB XFX cards (now using 16xPCIe2.0)
8x LG Bluray Reader/DVD Writer (meant to order the BD-writer, whoops)
256GB Crucial M225 SSD System drive
500GB User data drive
750GB Backup data drive
3x1.5TB Data drives
Belkin Bluetooth

XBench before: 156.06
XBench after: 410.47

Even better, the simulations I have to run for work now run over twice as fast and three times as fast if I'm running eight of them thanks to Hyperthreading.

Total cost of upgrading was about £1500 although I should recoup a fair chunk of that by selling off the old Mac Pro parts. It's running incredibly well at the moment, OS X is great, Windows is great. The only issue I have is that I can't get my second 4870 to work in OS X no matter what I try. Half the time I start up, its fans are spinning like mad until I restart. I only have the second 4870 for Windows crossfire use anyway but I'd like it to work in OS X for CUDA maybe and to stop the fan from being noisy. I'll probably upgrade to a 5970 when 5xxx series drivers get added into OS X though.
Click to expand...

Very nice job of putting it into a mac pro case. Also look into something similar to http://www.neoseeker.com/Articles/Hardware/Reviews/5870vaporx/

I like quiet systems so having a nice cooler that is quiet and efficient if my preference over FPS.
 
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