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  • Hey all, just changed over the backend after 15 years I figured time to give it a bit of an update, its probably gonna be a bit weird for most of you and i am sure there is a few bugs to work out but it should kinda work the same as before... hopefully :)

New iMac or Hack Pro?

B

BrandonChristensen

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I'm wavering between these two right now. I'm currently on a 2006 Mac Pro 1.1 upgraded to 2x Quad Core 3.00Ghz chips, Radeon 5770 and 16GB RAM but it's showing its age when dealing with RED stuff. I'd love to get some Mercury Playback going up in here so I have decided on the following.

1. The new iMac
Specs: 3.4Ghz i7, 32GB RAM (purchased outside of Apple of course), 1TB Fusion (Can't replace these without tearing it apart apparently, I'd prefer to just have a 256GB Samsung 840 Pro in there), and the GTX680 2GB.

This will run me somewhere around $2900.

2. Build a Hack Pro.

I could build one for around $2000 with similar specs as that, probably even a tad less. I'd maintain the ability to upgrade everything as well which is always good.

The pros of the iMac are...
+ Stable
+ Apple Care
+ Cleans up my workspace
+ Great 27" Screen Included

- Pricey
- Zero upgrade path

The pros of the Hack Pro
+ Cheaper
+ More powerful
+ Can always upgrade
+ A ton more options for flexibility

- Need to buy a separate monitor
- No real support if something goes wrong.
- Stability Issues


I know a lot of you have built some awesome rigs around here, so hopefully someone has an opinion.

Also, how much would my computer fetch roughly in the open market?
 
Couldn't you see Mark as Ian McShane

Couldn't you see Mark as Ian McShane

'I know a bloke, who knows a bloke, who knows a bloke'

now you know this bloke... this is a bloke you know'

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mYUkMemWNvo


Sexy%2BBeast%2B2000%2BIan%2BMcShane%2Bpic%2B3.jpg



Mark_Pederson-2-300x200.jpg
 
I have a hac pro and it's an absolute blast. Geekbench score of 17,500, super fast, expandable, had it since August, no instability issues to report. Everything works great. Just wanna throw that into the mix.
 
Alexander - specs and installation method please :)

I have a 2009 Mac Pro that's getting a bit long in the tooth.

So, if the new Apple product coming in the next couple months isn't as attractive as I hope it is - I may need to go the hackintosh route (which is ironically where I started)
 
Sure thing!
My build is very similar to this golden build from the TonyMac forums, just with a few parts upgrades :)
http://www.tonymacx86.com/golden-bu...d5h-i7-3770k-gigabyte-geforce-gtx-660-ti.html

Intel 3770K 3.5 ghz quad core overclocked to 4.8ghz w/Corsair H100 liquid cooling
32GB Corsair Vengeance 1600mhz ram
Gigabyte Z77X UP5 TH Thunderbolt motherboard.
Gigabyte GTX 660ti 2GB nVidia graphics card
Corsair Force Series GT 120GB SSD for the boot drive.
(2) Seagate 3TB HDDs for general storage.
TP-Link Wifi a/b/g/n PCIe adapter
Syba PCIe FireWire 400/800 adapter
Pioneer Blu Ray/DVD/CD reader/writer

$1,731.65 after tax! Better GeekBench performance than EVERY MAC EVER MADE, with the exception of the 12 core Mac Pros. (Though it's not far behind)

Geekbench http://browser.primatelabs.com/geekbench2/1265567

The case I used is the Cooler Master HAF X. Not exactly the most subtle case, but it's big which makes the rig easy to put together. And with 200mm fans, the case is surprisingly quiet and has the best airflow and cooling performance of any full tower on the market, at least when I got it last November. You could easily fit this system in something like a Corsair Carbide 400R but the 120mm fans are a bit louder. Really though, the choice of case is irrelevant. Any half or full tower case will do the job. It just depends on how much expandability you want.

Followed the instructions on the TonyMac guide and it ended up working flawlessly. All of the early problems are new solved now that OSX is updated to 10.8.2. Nvidia GTX660ti works natively, wifi and Ethernet natively, USB3 and ESATA work flawlessly. Sleep works great, and the system overall is quite stable and snappy. I have never encountered anything major, just minor bugs like USB drives becoming disconnected after waking from sleep, and not being able to sign into iMessage. The good news is that last bug has been fixed with the new Chimera boot loader, so now I can use iMessage and FaceTime on the Hac. I don't use USB drives so the USB disconnect on sleep issue isn't too much of a bother for me, especially considering all the money I'm saving :)

The one upgrade I still need to do is upgrade the storage interface from 7200 rpm drives to a thunderbolt RAID or perhaps an internal RAID.


If you guys are interested I could post some pics and a breakdown of the installation and configuration of the hackintosh.
 
Awesome, thank you!

It sounds amazing, and that price is killer.

I'd love to see pics if you wouldn't mind.
 
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