Let me show you my MacPro... I mean HackPro ;)

[InsaneNutter]

Last month my PC's motherboard failed, luckily it was in warranty so I was able to choose a new motherboard from Ebuyer.com

Anyway when reading reviews about the motherboard I was going to buy it turned it that particular motherboard worked perfectly with Mac OSX, so once I got my PC up and running again I figured it would be interesting to see if I could get OSX working on it.

Installing:

OSX was really that easy to install, all I had to do was insert a boot cd then swap to a retail OSX Snow Leopard DVD when it asked me to. (OSX is £25 on the apple website.) I then installed just like I would as if I was installing OSX on a real Mac.

After the installation has finished I updated to the latest 10.6.4 update and ran an application which made my OSX install bootable and fixed the sound which the 10.6.4 update broke. Thats it, such little effort and I have a perfectly working OSX install.

The only real problem I had was that OSX didnt like my NTFS formatted drives with Windows 7 on which caused it to crash when booting if the drives were connected, that problem was solved by installing Pargon NTFS for Mac 8.0. That also let me write to my 500gb download drive which was a nice bonus too, so now my Mac and Windows 7 installs can share files.

My Xbox 360 webcam worked out the box, as did my printer and bluetooth dongle.
The Canon website had drivers for my scanner and someone had created drivers for the Xbox 360 Wireless Gaming Receiver.

So now I have a pretty nice Mac that 3 years ago cost me half the price an new iMac does today... Its 130mhz slower however beats it in every other way

Spec:

Processor: 2.93ghz Dual Core (overclocked from 2.2ghz)
Ram: 4GB DDR2 1066mhz (overclocked from 800mhz)
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-EP45-UD3LR iP45
Hard drive: 250gb for OSX + 500gb storage drive
Graphics: Nvidia Geforce 8800GT
Monitor: 22" Dell Ultrasharp 2208WFP
Printer: Canon IP 4500
Scanner: Canon Lide 90
Webcam: Xbox Live Vision Camera
Joypad: Xbox 360 Wireless Gaming Receiver (Drivers)
Bluetooth: USB 2.0 Bluetooth dongle

My HackPro:

About this Mac:

Photobooth: My breakfast... yum!

Bluetooth & Google Chrome:

Steam for Mac:

2D games work perfectly:

As do 3D games:

The iPhone episode of Futurama

Here is the guide / boot cd I used to get OSX up and running: Kakewalk: Minimal effort install (EP45, EX58, P55, G41), Kakewalk is a simple vanilla method for installing Snow Leopard.

 

[Gorge]

Hello,

Nice.
I wish to have the same. But buying a new motherboard is not expected (unless it fails)

I have a 'MacOS' like : Ubuntu 10 with a theme.
But this is not quite the same.
Bravo for this nice machine.

Gorge

 

[MasterChief]

60fps in Counter Strike, that destroys my real Mac... the game is not even playable on our family's Macbook.

My mate built his own hackintosh too, for playing games its so much nicer with Steam now out on the Mac I might have to look in to building one too, it looks like a lot of games could soon be on the Mac.

 

[mamamamia88]

i always wanted to try this but don't think i would want to use a computer constantly worrying if an update is going to break it. I just use ubuntu

 

[InsaneNutter]

If you install from a retail DVD like this updates shouldn't break the install, its mainly the hacked together DVD's that cause problems later on. The only thing I might have problems with is sound which can be fixed by pressing two buttons anyway.

Its not my main OS, nothing will replace Windows 7 for me. I just wanted to be able to run some OSX only apps such as Final Cut Studio and generally mess about with it.

 

[mamamamia88]

ah cool. looks simple enough insert bootloader cd then when it tells you insert retail dvd and install like normal. is there a way to find the exact hardware that is in an imac so you shouldn't have driver compatability issues?

 

[InsaneNutter]

Makesure you have one of the compatible motherboards:

• Gigabyte EP45-UD3LR
• Gigabyte EP45T-UD3LR
• Gigabyte EP45-UD3R
• Gigabyte EP45-UD3P
• Gigabyte EX58-UD5
• Gigabyte EX58-UD3R
• Gigabyte EX58A-UD7
• Gigabyte EP45-UD3L
• Gigabyte EP45-DS3L
• Gigabyte P55M-UD2
• MSI P55M-GD45
• Gigabyte G41M-ES2L
• Gigabyte EX58-UD4P
• Gigabyte X58A-UD3R

Any Core2Duo / Quad CPU should be fine.
Ram doesn't really matter as long as it is compatible with your motherboard.
You will need a SATA hard drive with AHCI enabled in the Bios.
Any Nvidia graphics card in the 8 series or higher should work fine.

(Note you will need a USB Keyboard / Mouse to install, however after installing you can enable PS2 support if required)

Ofcourse a lot of other hardware is supported, what I mentioned above is what should work perfect with the Kakewalk boot cd I used.

Even AMD processors are compatible, just not with the method I used to install, the install process will vary depending on your hardware.

Look on the OSx86 Wiki and scroll down to hardware compatibility list to get some idea what works, it is mainly down to if your motherboard is compatible or not.

 

[Safinn]

Very nice... Should be getting a new PC next month but the specs I have in mind are not supported for this

 

[z3ddrocksz]

I'm currently installing Tiger onto my desktop because anything higher won't run on it. But it's still pretty cool because I got the desktop for free.

 

[mamamamia88]

what program did you use to make partition bootable without dvd in drive? thinking of trying this when i get some money looks simple enough.

 

[InsaneNutter]

After installing you swap back to the boot cd, when that is in you get the option to boot the partition you installed to.

Once in OSX you run a program on the boot cd that makes your partition bootable and your then good to go.

 

[mamamamia88]

After installing you swap back to the boot cd, when that is in you get the option to boot the partition you installed to.

Once in OSX you run a program on the boot cd that makes your partition bootable and your then good to go.

sweet it sounds super easy. how stable is it and do you encounter any strange bugs? might want to do it when i get some money saved up. i'm a linux user been contemplating getting a mac but could never find one worth the asking price. if i was going to spend that much money i at least want to be able to easily upgrade videocard for gaming etc.

 

[InsaneNutter]

The only thing I have noticed is when Windows 7 has been loaded up and you re start to boot OSX sometimes OSX will fail to boot. However if you shutdown instead of re starting and power the PC back on OSX will boot perfectly every time.

Its probably worth mentioning Windows 7 and OSX are totally septate from each other on my PC, Windows 7 will boot by default when I power my PC on. If I want to boot OSX I press F12 to bring the boot menu up and select the hard drive I installed OSX to. You can create a boot menu with them both on however I wanted to keep everything as septate as possible.

Other than that minor problem OSX is working perfectly, it has never crashed. I have installed quite a few applications now, all work perfectly.

Ive had the PC on with OSX running all day then put it to sleep at night, woke it up the next day and OSX worked fine for another day, no problems what so ever... its easily as stable as a real mac would be running OSX.

 

[mamamamia88]

The only thing I have noticed is when Windows 7 has been loaded up and you re start to boot OSX sometimes OSX will fail to boot. However if you shutdown instead of re starting and power the PC back on OSX will boot perfectly every time.

Its probably worth mentioning Windows 7 and OSX are totally septate from each other on my PC, Windows 7 will boot by default when I power my PC on. If I want to boot OSX I press F12 to bring the boot menu up and select the hard drive I installed OSX to. You can create a boot menu with them both on however I wanted to keep everything as septate as possible.

Other than that minor problem OSX is working perfectly, it has never crashed. I have installed quite a few applications now, all work perfectly.

Ive had the PC on with OSX running all day then put it to sleep at night, woke it up the next day and OSX worked fine for another day, no problems what so ever... its easily as stable as a real mac would be running OSX.

so question of the day, is it worth it or is it just fun doing it?

 

[InsaneNutter]

Depends what you want, if you want OSX then yes, it will function perfectly without the cost of buying a massively overpriced Mac.

I did it just for fun and to see if i could do it.

OSX wouldn't replace Windows 7 for me, however having also used Ubuntu I would choose OSX over it. You might find its a nice improvement, I would say its all down to personal preference.

 

[Safinn]

I think OSX looks amazing graphicaly but I don't think it matches Windows in functionality.