PC vs. Mac Desktops, Cont'd (Building a Mac Pro?)

[mrlynn]

Follow up to this thread,

http://forums.macresource.com/read.php?1,837900

My daughter and her husband (with help from his brother) have decided to build their own desktop PC to match the capabilities of a Mac Pro. My daughter writes:

When deciding on parts, J made some judicious compromises based on price, quality, and our specific needs at the moment. As a result, the Mac Pro has a few benefits over our computer, but James thinks they are probably not useful benefits for the extra cost. For example, James says the Mac Pro is designed to be able to be used as a server, so it has a processor which is particularly good for that, and it has error-checking memory and mother-board, which is also good for that purpose. It makes it slightly less likely to crash with the constant use that a server gets. In some respects, our computer will be superior to the basic Mac Pro (more RAM, bigger hard drive, faster DVD burner, and significantly better graphics card). We spent a total of about $950 including the monitor (a 24" Samsung for $189, which is not a super great monitor, but hopefully will be good enough since we didn't want to jump to the $500 price bracket at this point). We haven't gotten a keyboard yet because I wanted to try them out first and find one that feels nice. We would have liked to do the same with housings, to make sure the buttons don't feel junky, but oh well. We had to gamble based on reviews.

Theoretically, the money we're saving on the family desktop can be used later to get me a MacBook Pro. :-)

She adds:

J spent a long time researching parts, reading reviews, and figuring out compatibility. So we hope our computer will work! We started by breaking down what the Mac Pro has, and did figure that you could probably (in theory) buy all its component parts (or comparable ones, where the exact part is unavailable to consumers or unspecified in the specs), including a copy of Mac OS, for far less than the cost of the fully built computer (even a refurb). Which is to be expected. Unfortunately, it's difficult to get the OS to run on a "hackintosh" [she's been told] because Apple wants to sell both hardware and software together. . .

I know that hackintoshes are popular here, but I'm not up to speed. Don't you still have to have Apple ROMs to run the Mac OS on any computer, even an Intel PC? If not, what do they have to do to create an hackintosh Mac Pro clone?

/Mr Lynn

[deckeda]

mrlynn wrote:
... Don't you still have to have Apple ROMs to run the Mac OS on any computer, even an Intel PC?

No.

Sounds like they prefer a project to a pre-built anything. It's their money, let's let them enjoy it as they see fit. But that doesn't mean you have to listen to "but it's just as capable as a Mac Pro ..." misunderstandings. If they didn't understand that prior to purchase, there's zero chance of them understanding (or rather, agreeing to) it after they're invested in another direction.

[decay]

http://www.insanelymac.com/forum/

[mrlynn]

deckeda wrote:
[quote=mrlynn]
... Don't you still have to have Apple ROMs to run the Mac OS on any computer, even an Intel PC?

No.

Sounds like they prefer a project to a pre-built anything. It's their money, let's let them enjoy it as they see fit. But that doesn't mean you have to listen to "but it's just as capable as a Mac Pro ..." misunderstandings. If they didn't understand that prior to purchase, there's zero chance of them understanding (or rather, agreeing to) it after they're invested in another direction.
I read somewhere that you still needed Apple 'boot ROMs' to get the Mac OS to run on a non-Apple PC. If so, there must be a way around it for the mini 'hackintoshes' to work. If not, what's to keep everyone from installing OS X on any random Gateway junk?

I used the phrase, "match the capabilities," not her. But if the custom PC components are comparable, if not better, in what ways would the Mac Pro be more capable than the PC (aside from avoiding internal cables)?

/Mr Lynn

[anonymouse1]

If you can post the motherboard and graphics card she's using, we can probably point her to good hackintosh advice.

Long story short--if she's comfortable building her own PC, she can probably turn it into a Hackintosh. It will help if she has access to a real Mac during setup.

[deckeda]

mrlynn wrote:

I read somewhere that you still needed Apple 'boot ROMs' to get the Mac OS to run on a non-Apple PC. If so, there must be a way around it for the mini 'hackintoshes' to work. If not, what's to keep everyone from installing OS X on any random Gateway junk?

dk's link will help. The abridged version is that as long as the PC hardware is close enough (similar mobo design/CPU, compatible graphics etc.) then Tiger, Leopard and Snow Leopard can work (with variable success) once the installer is tricked into thinking it's going onto a Mac.

That last part no longer requires a particular chip nor special firmware to be present on the mobo. Since Tiger, Intel Macs have used Intel's EFI (a substitute for BIOS) to know what they're running on. And EFI can be modified in software. Again, insanelymac is a good starting point to learn the details.

[decay]

found this:

http://wiki.osx86project.org/wiki/index.php/Main_Page

Simply put: fairly recent model Intel chipset & CPU, USB mouse & keyboard, SATA-only drives.

Using a non-Intel chipset, AMD CPU, PS/2 mouse or keyboard, or IDE drives can be somewhat trickier to get OSX working.

If buying a new board, I'd suggest the Gigabyte GA-EP45-UD3R (or -UD3P) board as a good place to start looking.

The Hackintosh 101 Thread
http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=153266

[M A V I C]

I haven't checked in a month or so, but one of the processors in the current Mac Pro retails for about $1300. For most things like using the web, Photoshop, InDesign, Maya, After Effects, Final Cut Studio... that processor doesn't perform any better than another Intel processor that goes for about $300.

For example, I've got my hackintosh dialed in pretty well now. Anandtech's retouch artist's test put the current 2x2.26GHz Mac Pro at 22.2 seconds. My hackintosh comes in about a second slower. And that difference could very well be that their test was run on a clean SSD, and mine wasn't. (And since OS X doesn't support TRIM, there are performance issues.) Or it could be that my system only has 4GB of RAM and the Mac Pro has 6GB. (I can add another 4GB for under $100.)

However, I paid about $800 for all my hackintosh parts. A Mac Pro is $3300 - over 400% more expensive for about a 5% speed boost, if any.

That said, if the only spent about $760 I have to ask myself where they skimped.
i5 = $200
A better video card than the Mac Pro = $100
More RAM = at least $150
Bigger HD = $100
A fair mobo = $130
Optical drive = $30

That leaves $50 for a case & PSU. A good PSU to run that alone is $50, at least. I hope they didn't skimp on the RAM. Hackintoshes are more picky about RAM than Windows. And a cheap PSU is only going to cause problems. Plus the i5 isn't a completely fair comparison - should be an i7 which is another $80.

[M A V I C]

decay wrote:
found this:

http://wiki.osx86project.org/wiki/index.php/Main_Page

Simply put: fairly recent model Intel chipset & CPU, USB mouse & keyboard, SATA-only drives.

Using a non-Intel chipset, AMD CPU, PS/2 mouse or keyboard, or IDE drives can be somewhat trickier to get OSX working.

If buying a new board, I'd suggest the Gigabyte GA-EP45-UD3R (or -UD3P) board as a good place to start looking.

The Hackintosh 101 Thread
http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=153266

That must be an old recommendation. It will certainly get you a machine that works and do so fairly easily, but it will cost more and perform worse than other options. If someone wants to go that route, the most recent lifehacker build with better RAM and PSU would be good.

[abevilac]

...I dunno...seems like a lot of work when you can get a 24" refurb iMac for $1099 which includes the mouse and keyboard [as well as, of course, a monitor] and you can be sure that it will run the OS. That's my opinion.