hackintosh

aidanki

hi all,

Looking at building a hackintosh at the minute, I want to do a dual boot machine, put all my windows stuff CAD etc on the windows part of the machine and use MAC for browsing. This way I hope I will have a machine which won't get slow for next 7-8years.

the day I want my CAD & MS Office I will start up Windows, otherwise I will just start up MAC ?

Is this a viable option ?

Ant695

It's certainly possible but personally I wouldn't think it's worth it just to have the mac side for browsing. Usually people doing this would want to use mac specific software.

I would have said it would be better to build just a windows pc and use it for browsing as well.

FSL

Machines get slow because people fill them up with all sorts of rubbish which load on start up and perform no worthwhile function.

RoyalMarine

Yes, it's possible and viable.

Easily done if you have the correct hardware.
I've installed it a few times, and never had any issues.

One of the benefits is you don't pay Apple prices..

head over to tonymacx86.com for installation guides.

(Remember, you need a Mac to prepare the installation media. Takes approx 30-40 mins, so if you have a mate who has a Mac, you can do it there).

Bit of advice. Forget going through all of this unless you have 2 or 3 hard-drives in your computer.
1 for OS X
1 for Windows
1 for shared drive. (ex fat formatted).

You can split one drive for Windows and shared drive.
Best to leave OS X on it's own separate drive rather than partition as it gets frustrating due to the EFI boot loader.

ZENER

Why not run a virtual Mac using VirtualBox or similar. IMO a far more usable solution.

Ken

Kyousuke

ZENER wrote: »

Why not run a virtual Mac using VirtualBox or similar. IMO a far more usable solution.

Ken

True, but a sandboxed operating system will always run a little slower.

ZENER

It depends on the host system but if it's only for web browsing it should be fine. I have a couple running in VirtualBox for Labs and research and they're fine.

Having built several Hacks' they can be unstable and break with little or no effort, don't like AMD processors much (requires a special Kernel) and a simple software update can destroy it !

You'll also need to have compatible hardware, preferably hardware normally used by a real Mac (e.g. Graphics Cards, NICs, WiFi adapters, Audio chipsets, an Intel chipset on the mainboard) to minimise driver issues. Once all that is done they can work fine but you'll think twice before installing an update !!

Of course all the above is completely against the Apple EULA unless run in VMWare Fusion on Apple Hardware. It's also frowned upon on Boards.ie I think.

Ken

Dr_Bill

Yes it is technically possible.

As recommended head over to tonymacx86 or insanelymac for resources on how to tackle the project there is a good community there.

Initial hardware choices for a hackintosh are key to ensuring compatibility, don't expect everything to work straight away once the OS is installed, you must be prepared to do a little work to get drivers and other issues sorted yourself.

Disable automatic updates once everything is up and running as otherwise bad things might happen but if your up to the challenge and want to learn it can be fun but will require patience and perseverance.

Another option worth considering is buying a cheap Mac which is broken and just fix it up. I've see 27" Mac's on ebay for under a tenner but need work & parts to get them going again potentially could be cheaper than a new hackintosh build?

Zillah

I've built two systems for this exact set up. It can be a bit finicky trying to sort out the booting though. Things never go exactly according to plan, always some troubleshooting to be done in my experience. First machine is absolutely perfect and has been for a couple years now. Second one is newer and a little unstable. It hates powered USB drives. Windows is guaranteed to crash 100% of the time within a couple of minutes of plugging one in, the Mac end will handle them fine most of the time but will seize up on occasion.

Could just be dodgy power sockets in my office though now that I think about it, lol

Anyway as said go to tonymacx and follow the guide there. It's a project, though, make no mistake, and I certainly wouldn't bother for the sake of browsing.

PropJoe10

If you just want it for browsing, install a Linux distro. No viruses and far easier to set up as a dual boot with Windows.