--- title: "Building a Hackintosh Pro" date: 2017-03-18 status: published tags: [technology] intro: "If Apple built a compact, upgradeable tower that could house one or two full-size GPUs, I'd have bought it without hesitation. Sadly, that machine doesn't exist." image: src: blog/hackintosh/hackintosh-vs-imac.jpg alt: "Hackintosh" --- If Apple built a compact, upgradeable tower that could house one or two full-size GPUs, I'd have bought it without hesitation. Sadly, that machine doesn't exist. There's no doubt that Apple has a refresh for the desktop market in the works. I just don't know if it's going to be enough to satisfy the creative market, who seem to be [slowly migrating](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13797042) to [Windows](https://petapixel.com/2017/03/15/tray-ratcliff-says-apple-dead-explains-switched). Maybe Apple has been waiting for the recently released Ryzen CPUs from AMD? Or maybe they're just waiting for WWDC to announce their new pro desktop machines. Either way, I really hope they get it right this time. A modern cheese grater Mac would make a lot of professionals very, very happy. I've used Macs for the last 20+ years, and in recent years I've also had a gaming PC at home. This is nice, but having to find room for both machines, along with juggling separate monitors, keyboards, and mice is a pain. Especially when you consider they're both running off the same architecture. Wouldn't it be nice to have just one machine that could do everything… So yeah, building a Hackintosh means I'll be able to have just one kick-ass machine that can boot into either macOS or Windows. Perfect. ## Research & Build I spent a week or so researching how to build a Hackintosh. I watched plenty of YouTube videos, read articles, and spent a lot of time on the [tonymacx86](http://tonymacx86.com/) website. As many others have pointed out, this is time well spent, and probably the best way to learn how to do it. There are basically three parts to building a Hackintosh: picking the right components, actually building the thing, and finally getting macOS installed and running. As long as you take your time and research each part properly, you'll be fine. I wanted to build a machine that was faster than my current MacBook Pro and would be able to replace my gaming PC. This basically boiled down to picking the fastest CPU and GPU that macOS supports without resorting to any hacks. I used the [tonymacx86 build guides](https://www.tonymacx86.com/buyersguide/building-a-customac-hackintosh-the-ultimate-buyers-guide/$0) to get started, and if I wanted to stray from the exact items listed there, I checked the forums to make sure the components were suitable. I can't stress enough how useful the [tonymacx86 website](http://tonymacx86.com/) is. ![Apple Hackintosh Pro on Desk](blog/hackintosh/apple-hackintosh-pro-on-desk.jpg) While picking two of the most important components, the CPU and GPU, I hit a few snags. macOS doesn't yet support Intel's 7th Generation Kaby Lake processors, so I had to go with the previous generation Skylake processor. Not a huge deal, as an i7 4.0 GHz processor is still faster than any MacBook Pro you can buy. The other slight compromise I had to make was on the graphics card. The best "supported" GPU you can get is the GeForce GTX 980 Ti or the GeForce Titan X. macOS and the Mac Nvidia drivers don't yet support Nvidia's more powerful new 10-series range of Pascal-based cards. Still, the GTX 980 Ti will run rings around most PCs, and any Mac you can buy. The best part about this is that you can now get a GTX 980 Ti fairly cheaply as PC users are ditching these in favour of the latest generation cards. The 980 Ti is more than powerful enough to play all the latest games with settings set to "Very High" or "Ultra" depending on your screen resolution. ## Hackintosh Components After plenty of research, here's the final set of components I settled on for the "Hackintosh Pro". - Case: Phanteks Evolv ATX Tempered Glass Edition – £171.15 - Case Lighting: Phanteks LED System Cabinet Lighting – £24.07 - Motherboard: Asus Z170-A – £131.99 - Graphics Card: ASUS NVIDIA GeForce GTX 980 Ti – £275.00 (via eBay) - Processor: Intel Core i7 6700K Processor 4.0 Ghz – £307.99 - Power Supply: EVGA Supernova 850 W Gold G2 Series – £127.92 - Memory: Trident Z RGB Series 32 GB (8 GB x 4) DDR4 3000 MHz – £388.53 - Cooler: Corsair Hydro Series H100i V2 240mm Liquid CPU Cooler – £106.99 - Wi-Fi / Bluetooth: Fenvi FV T919 802.11AC Wifi Card – £45 - Storage: Samsung 850 EVO 1TB SSD – £299.99 (Windows) - Storage: Samsung 850 EVO 2TB SSD – £589.99 (macOS) - Storage: 5TB Seagate Internal HD – Already Owned (Mac Backup) **Build Cost: £1,578.64** (£2,468.62 with SSDs) The most expensive items in the build were storage and memory. It turns out 3TB of SSD storage and 32GB of fast memory is still quite pricey. Had I gone for a more modest setup I could have cut this cost in half. If you're price sensitive, you could build a Hackintosh for under £1,000. You'd just need to go for the basics and not max everything out. Again, [Tonymacx86](https://www.tonymacx86.com/buyersguide/building-a-customac-hackintosh-the-ultimate-buyers-guide/) has a selection of example builds to get you started. ## Pimp My Hackintosh When I set out to build a Hackintosh, I knew I wanted a stupid amount of LEDs in the case and on the desk. I figured if I'm going to essentially build a PC, I may as well go all in. This is very different from my previous Mac setups, and is definitely a love it or hate it kind of thing. Personally, I really dig it. ![Apple Hackintosh Pro on Desk](blog/hackintosh/apple-hackintosh-pro-on-desk.jpg) ![Apple Hackintosh Pro with RGB Lights](blog/hackintosh/apple-hackintosh-pro-on-desk-with-rgb.jpg) ![Apple Hackintosh Pro with Keyboard and Mouse](blog/hackintosh/apple-hackintosh-pro-blue-and-keyboard.jpg) ![Apple Hackintosh Pro close-up](blog/hackintosh/apple-hackintosh-pro-close-up.jpg) ![Apple Hackintosh Pro close-up red RGB](blog/hackintosh/apple-hackintosh-pro-close-up-red.jpg) ![Apple Hackintosh Pro with blue RGB lights](blog/hackintosh/apple-hackintosh-pro-blue-rgb.jpg) ![Apple Hackintosh Pro Graphics Card](blog/hackintosh/apple-hackintosh-pro-close-up-graphics-card.jpg) I stopped short of buying coloured cables and just went with the stock ones supplied. I was honestly tempted, but as this was my first build I decided to play it safe. Now I've built the Hackintosh, I feel confident I could replace the cables with some fancier-looking ones along with adding some RGB fans to really complete the build. ## Hackintosh Benchmarks I did some quick benchmark tests with my MacBook Pro and Hackintosh. I sourced the Mac Pro results from the internet. The Mac Pro only wins in multi-core performance (something you won't notice in day-to-day use). The Hackintosh beats both machines in single-core performance and absolutely destroys them on 3D performance. The price difference is eye-watering. - Hackintosh: i7 @ 4.0 GHz (4-Cores), GeForce GTX 980 Ti, £1,578.64 - MacBook Pro: i7 @ 2.90 GHz (4-Cores), Radeon Pro 455, £2,879.00 - Mac Pro: Xeon @ 2.7 GHz (12-Cores), Dual AMD FirePro D700, £7,139.00 On all the graphs below, longer bars are better. ![Hackintosh Geekbench Benchmark Results](blog/hackintosh/hackintosh-geekbench-benchmarks.jpg) ![Hackintosh Unigine Valley Benchmark Results](blog/hackintosh/hackintosh-unigine-valley-benchmarks.jpg) Comparing my Hackintosh score on Geekbench confirms that it's faster in single-core performance than any other Mac Apple currently sells. Maybe this will change soon as Apple is due to release updated desktop hardware. The good thing is that as Apple supports newer and better processors the Hackintosh community should be able to take advantage of them (e.g. Ryzen or Kaby Lake). ## Final Thoughts Building a Hackintosh is not for everybody. There's an overwhelming number of parts to choose from, and you need to pick the ones that are compatible. Once you've built the machine, you still need to get macOS running on it. If you want to do it, do your research and take your time. I'd say this build took me around 8 hours from unboxing the components to getting macOS installed, spread over a few days. ![Hackintosh Sticker from Etsy](blog/hackintosh/hackintosh-vs-imac.jpg) I've been running this machine for a couple of weeks now and I couldn't be happier. It's super fast and I can easily switch between macOS and Windows. I've switched off auto-updates in Sierra. While system updates should work just fine, I prefer to hold off until the community over at [tonymacx86](https://www.tonymacx86.com/) has confirmed there are no issues. This is probably one of the major drawbacks to running a Hackintosh. If you're into tech and enjoy tinkering and understanding how things work, you'll find building a Hackintosh is hugely rewarding. *P.S. If you like the Hackintosh sticker in the photo above, you can get your own set over on [Etsy](https://www.etsy.com/uk/listing/105566118/hackintosh-apple-skull-logo-custom-mash?ref=listing-shop-header-1).*