froglegs Posted October 9, 2014 Share Posted October 9, 2014 Most of the high end Mac Pro hackintosh builds are using Intel's enthusiest platform (i.e. X79 chipset, 3930K / 4930K processor). Since Apple doesn't use these components in any of their systems, it can be difficult to get everything functioning properly. I did a bit of reading to figure out what exactly Apple uses in the new Mac Pro. It's pretty well known that Apple uses the Xeon E5 v2 processor (E5-1620 v2, E5-1650 v2, E5-1680 v2 and E5-2697 v2 for the 4-core, 6-core, 8-core and 12-core options respectively). I also confirmed that Apple uses the Intel C602J chipset in the 4-Core model (I couldn't confirm that the same chipset is used with the other 3 processors but I assume that it is). Regardless of the exact brand / model motherboard you use, as long as the motherboard uses the C602J chipset, the majority of onboard devices should be identical and thus supported by OSX, correct? Obviously depending on the exact model, the 3rd party additions such as USB 3.0, additional SATA controllers and on-board audio will differ and may not be supported but you can just disable these in the BIOS. If I built a computer using one of the above Xeon E5 v2 processors and a C602J based motherboard, it should work right out of the box shouldn't it? I'd obviously hand pick the rest of the hardware as well (audio, video, wireless networking, bluetooth, additional SATA / USB controllers, thunderbolt) for compatibility with OSX. It seems though, that the most important factors determining overall functionality of the system are the CPU and the motherboard / chipset. Like I said, there is no shortage of information pertaining to X79 builds but I can't find much info on builds that use the exact components used in the 2013 Mac Pro and if using the exact processor and chipset (as opposed to an X79 based system) would solve the problems associated with the X79 systems. Any suggestions / experiences are greatly appreciated. Thanks Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
froglegs Posted October 10, 2014 Author Share Posted October 10, 2014 I might have been unclear about a few things so here's a more "to the point" post: Any components in a hackintosh that apple actually uses in some of their current systems, will be recognized and properly installed by OSX in the hackintosh system, correct? Problems arise when you use components that aren't found in any of the systems sold by apple (for example, when building a 2013 Mac Pro hackintosh, using an X79 based Motherboard instead of a C602J based motherboard like the actual Mac Pro)? There are plenty of examples of people carefully selecting the components for their iMac / Mac Mini hackintosh systems and these systems are 100% perfectly functional (if it weren't for the bootloader you'd never know it was a hackintosh). I can't find any examples of people doing this with the 2013 Mac Pro though (as I said, everybody uses Intel's X79 platform instead). I realize there aren't very many first hand experiences out there. I don't mind taking a little risk and being the first one to test this out. I just don't want to waste my time and money on a complete lost cause (there's something I'm missing and this system will most likely have the same problems that the X79 / 4930K systems have). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts