PROJECT LOG My Hackintosh Build!

[neonthunder]

So I've not built a pc in a long time!! I think it was 15 years ago since my last build!

I built myself a pc as I could make it better spec and for half the price of a mac at the time. Then throughout the years I gradually moved to apple, got myself a G4 power book (which is still going strong!) and an iMac.

My reason for this build is i need a new mac due to my iMac being on its last legs and apple is now a rip off! Only good thing about them is the OS and I don't have £1000 spare.

So I'm building a Hackintosh on a budget that will hopefully cost half the price of the basic spec iMac and be alot better!

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iMac Spec - www.apple.com/uk

21.5-inch iMac - Item Price: £1,049.00
Hardware;
1.6GHz dual-core Intel Core i5, Turbo Boost up to 2.7GHz
8GB 1867MHz LPDDR3
1TB Serial ATA Drive @ 5400 rpm
Intel HD Graphics 6000
Magic Mouse 2
Magic Keyboard (British) & Users Guide (English)
Accessory Kit


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I've been using tonymacx86.com to help with the right configuration of parts to build the hackintosh.

My new Hackintosh Spec (Hopefully)

Gigabyte GA-Z170-HD3P Socket LGA1151 HDMI 7.1 Channel Audio Motherboard
£112.12

Intel Core i5 6600 3.3GHz Socket 1151 6MB L3 Cache Retail Boxed Processor
£214.98

Gigabyte GTX 750 Ti 4GB GDDR5 Dual-link DVI HDMI PCI-E Grpahics Card
£118.20

Corsair Vengeance LPX 8GB (2x4GB) DDR4 DRAM 2133MHz C13 Memory Kit - Red65.97

Samsung 850 EVO 250GB 2.5inch SSD £88.18

Corsair Carbide 300R Case with Window
£72.98

Corsair VS Series 550 Watt VS550 Power Supply
£38.49

Edimax Gigabit PCIe Network Card
£9.68

LG Super Multi Blue Internal 14x Blu-ray Disc Rewriter WH14NS40
£58.22

Total: £778.82

ALL PRICES / PARTS SOURCED FROM EBUYER.COM - this is just a guide for now, parts need changing in places - Im wanting to get the build cost under 600 Including 2 monitors.
Now the under £600 MIGHT BE A CHALLENGE.... BUT I LOVE A CHALLENGE!!

The idea is that the system will be upgradeable over time, so I will save money where ever I can to begin with like the case..... more to come on this shortly

And Im not going to get the parts right on first go, so no need for slating me etc. (Unlike some forums) I would however appreciate helpful input

 

[don256us]

I'm looking forward to seeing what you do.

 

[neonthunder]

So first place to start is the case - iMac's are nice and shiny but do look as cool as a custom build!!

So to save money I dichted the Corseair case and got this http://www.ebuyer.com/725458-avp-mamba-mid-tower-black-case-with-card-reader-cas-748beauty! For £20 delivered.



Now while its not the prettiest of cases it does have a free card reader and window panel plus a free fan and it's got enough room for everything.

Only thing is I want some customization and I can always change the case at a later date and it also give me something to do whilst I get the rest of my parts. It's actually in more parts then that now as I wanted to paint it all. I'm going for a grey / pink theme on it.



The main case colour I've gone for is Peugeot Graphite Grey - The pink will probly be in the form of LED's I'm not sure at the moment.


So this is were Im currently upto would love to get people's thoughts on it. Currently looking at intel processors and were I can save money.

Will update a.s.a.p.

- - - Updated - - -

I'm looking forward to seeing what you do.

Thanks

 

[knoober]

Im a super huge fan of these kinds of builds. Methinks I shall subscribe to this thread

 

[neonthunder]

So since I'm giving the case a new paint job thought I'd add a bad *** samurai / Oni to the back panel. But Im not sure wether to paint it on or cut it out?

Anyways whilst I was looking for inspration I came across this and its just what I'm looking for, plus my mate can do me the stencil on his vinyl cutter to save me time. It would also mean not having to buy a dremel and I've already go some neon pink paint.

 

[neonthunder]

On a slightly different note.. My iMac must know it's being replaced as it's decided to rectify its screen issues.....lol but I'm still going ahead with the build!!

 

[Blaylock]

Looking good Neonthunder. I would go the vinyl route with the Oni. I think it'll look better in the end. That case looks like a pretty decent bargain. Do you plan on using the stock intel cooler or an aftermarket one? Also one mod I would consider is replacing the front USB 2.0's with USB 3.0's as I tend to use the 3.0's exclusively.

 

[neonthunder]

Looking good Neonthunder. I would go the vinyl route with the Oni. I think it'll look better in the end. That case looks like a pretty decent bargain. Do you plan on using the stock intel cooler or an aftermarket one? Also one mod I would consider is replacing the front USB 2.0's with USB 3.0's as I tend to use the 3.0's exclusively.

Thanks - Think your right about the vinyl on the one, plus it's given me some other Ideas I can do over the case.

As for the cooler I'm not 100% sure, I had looked at downgrading to an i3 as it will have all the power I need and at first wasn't thinking of over clocking so the stock cooler would be fine. But I've been looking at overclocking so think I will go for something different. I've been doing some research and the i3 can be overclocked which is good but more research is needed.

if you have any reccommendations for coolers, Im open to suggestions.

USB 3.0..... I have a spare space for that on the front next to USB 2.0 - is it worth doing all 3 ports?

Just everything thing seems to be wireless apart from external HD and USB drives.

 

[Blaylock]

I have a pair of external USB3 HDD's and a USB3 flash drive that I'm constantly using. I would say at least one but that would depend on your personal uses.

There are a lot of coolers that we can recommend. I would suggest figuring out which CPU you will go with as the i3 will not need as much cooling as an i5.

 

[neonthunder]

So been sketching ideas for my case and this is roughly what it will look like



So grey colour case and then pink glitter vinyl. Will get a better mockup soon.

 

[Blaylock]

I'm confused. Is it your company that's awesome or you company's name that's awesome?

 

[neonthunder]

I'm confused. Is it your company that's awesome or you company's name that's awesome?

Both lol


So this is the spec list Im working from now, I do need a few more things but I'm hitting my £600 budget and still want 2monitors included!!

These are just rough costs for now.

Case - £20

Gigabyte GA-z170 - £110

Intel i3 Processor 6100 - £110

GTX 1050 Ti OC / 4GB - £240

Toshiba SSD 120GB - £50

Crucial RAM - 8GB DDR4 2133mhz (could change this too 4GB would save me about £20)

Blue Ray Drive - £50 (Could skip this as it's not essential)

Corsair VS series 550 Watt - £40

That brings me too £528 - If i downgrade too 4GB ram and skip the blue ray, Im saving myself £70 so my total is £450 which leaves me with £150 for monitors and a wifi card, maybe USB 3.0

Any other suggestions to save money where I can?

 

[Blaylock]

I'm not familiar with hackintosh requirements but if you go with the i3 then just stick with the stock cooler. I'm not familiar with Corsair's VS series. Is that a type-o? Jonnyguru.com is the place to go for PSU research. I know the EVGA GQ is a great budget/quality PSU. Not sure of pricing or availability in your area.

 

[Dlaw]

Is 120GB going to be enough storage room for you? After OS install, you'll only have about 80GB to work with. I can understand cutting costs, but you also want to be able to use this machine.

I was also going to suggest you ditch the network card, as the onboard should be more than sufficient, but it seems you've already done that.

What is this machine going to be used for primarily? I assume probably things like photo/video editing, correct? If so, you could easily step down from the 1050Ti to something more modest (like the 750Ti in your OP), and up the CPU back to an i5. Or, leave the i3, and get more storage space. You could also leave the i3 and double up on RAM, and probably still have enough leftover to at least get a 250GB drive. The 1050Ti will surely help you out with encoding, but getting to encoding won't be any fun if you run out of storage, RAM or the user experience is unsmooth.

I honestly wonder if you need more than the integrated graphics, actually. I mean, if you were gaming on this rig, it would make more sense to put Windows on it, wouldn't it? What is the GPU for?

 

[neonthunder]

Forgot to mention Im salvaging the 1TB hard in my mac, been in about 12months. The 120GB is just for OS and a few programs.

Im a graphic designer so can be quite photoshop heavy at times or big publications, also want to get into 3D / video work so would help with rendering etc.

i5 seems to expensive at the moment, So would stick with the i3. nether thought about swapping down on graphics card but certainly somethinge to consider.

 

[Dlaw]

An i5 would be expensive, but you would gain 2 physical cores over HT. It probably wouldn't be the most bang for your buck though, I agree.

So storage is taken care of then, my suggestion would be to step down on the GPU. A regular 1050 or 960 (if you can find one used for a good deal) would do you fine, I think, and might allow for 16GB of RAM depending on pricing in your area. Could you provide a site you intend to order from, and we can make suggestions based on pricing and availabilty? Unless you're set on what you have listed, which would probably work fine.

I would try to keep the BR drive, you never know when you can use one.

Also, if you're going with i3 and don't intend to overclock, you could go with an H- or B- chipset board and save some money there.

 

[knoober]

120gb is still hard to live on just for the OS unless you are diligent about moving user folders to the secondary drive (I know how with Windows but have no clue how that is managed Mac-wize)

Isn't photoshop a ram eating beast? I had always gotten that impression. From that standpoint I would try to get 16gb of ram, and even if photoshop wouldnt use it, you could make a ramdisk for anything that benefits from ultra fast read/writes (also photoshop right?) just a thought.

 

[neonthunder]

step down on the GPU. A regular 1050 or 960 (if you can find one used for a good deal) would do you fine, I think, and might allow for 16GB of RAM depending on pricing in your area. Could you provide a site you intend to order from, and we can make suggestions based on pricing and availabilty? Unless you're set on what you have listed, which would probably work fine.

I would try to keep the BR drive, you never know when you can use one.

Also, if you're going with i3 and don't intend to overclock, you could go with an H- or B- chipset board and save some money there.

Site's for purchasing parts would either be amazon.co.uk or ebuyer.co.uk

BR drive like you said will come in handy - As for the chipset i need one that is known to work with OSX but there is a list of quite a few that I'll look into more.

120gb is still hard to live on just for the OS unless you are diligent about moving user folders to the secondary drive (I know how with Windows but have no clue how that is managed Mac-wize)

Isn't photoshop a ram eating beast? I had always gotten that impression. From that standpoint I would try to get 16gb of ram, and even if photoshop wouldnt use it, you could make a ramdisk for anything that benefits from ultra fast read/writes (also photoshop right?) just a thought.

Planning to build a NAS to keep everything on and also use 1TB drive out of iMac

Yep photoshop is ram hungry, but you can turn existing space on your HD to act as a scratch disk if your low on ram, use to do it on my powerbook when doing heavy photoshop stuff it was a life saver.


As I've said I'm totally open to suggestions for hardware. Im still researching everything, just want a system thats upgradable over time with ram etc that'll keep up with my needs.

 

[neonthunder]

So took the case apary to give it a slight paint change.

Needs a few more coats now its back together. Took it apart so i could get in the corners etc.

Once done the rest of the case will be wrapped and have stickers on like in a previous post.

The sole purpose for painting the inside is it that should sparkle some leds in.

Then i think its time to finalize my parts list!

 

[neonthunder]

So a few things have got to change with the vinyl - the first being the samurai, Keeps messing up when trying to cut it out. So I've opted for Hello Kitty instead!! I was spurred on by the Hex Kitty build!
And the second thing is I've found some silver carbon fibre wrap!!! so very happy!!!