Nate H Posted January 10, 2009 Share Posted January 10, 2009 I was quite disappointed that there were no new mac mini's released at MacWorld this year. I decided to build a mac mini alternative. I was looking on forums for any info on mini-itx socket 775, quad-core and leopard compatible motherboards, though didn't find any info. I ordered the Zotec NF630i-f-e motherboard, the q6600 quad-core 2.4ghz, the Apex MI-100 case, a dvd writere, a 1u cpu cooling fan and 4gb of ddr2-800. It comes with an intel wireless card, which im not sure if will work or not. The chipset is nforce 630i, the video is gforce 7100. Which distro should I go with for this mobo? I would like to be able to install the retail dvd if possible. BTW - the whole setup comes to just under $400. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
or_astroman Posted January 28, 2009 Share Posted January 28, 2009 I was looking at nearly the same set-up. Have you had the chance to work with it yet? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nate H Posted January 28, 2009 Author Share Posted January 28, 2009 Yeah, I needed to go with a patched distor of osx86 to get it to work with the nvidia chipset. I went with ipc 10.5.6 off of TPB. Video drivers are non-existant though you can run graphics in evsa 3.0 mode and manually set your resolution through the boot.plist file. Ethernet works out of the box and sound didn't work at all. I ended up going with a usb optical audio soundcard. I was also having some issues getting it cool enough. I had to go with a 1u copper cpu cooler and silent fans as it is being used as a media center machine. If you need any help, let me know. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
teme Posted January 28, 2009 Share Posted January 28, 2009 http://www.logicsupply.com/products/mp965_dr add the rest of parts needed and wham, dunno how compatible with os x might be though maybe someone might have it and can report to us how it works with os x Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nate H Posted January 28, 2009 Author Share Posted January 28, 2009 http://www.logicsupply.com/products/mp965_dr add the rest of parts needed and wham, dunno how compatible with os x might be though maybe someone might have it and can report to us how it works with os x The cost of the barebone is like the total cost of my rig. That's so much more expensive and half the power. I've looked at smaller cases for mine though haven't settled on a different one yet. The whole point of this is to build a powerful media center machine capable of doing 1080p playback and other things. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
or_astroman Posted January 28, 2009 Share Posted January 28, 2009 Did the wireless card work? I pretty much though audio would be a bust so I had planned on usb from the get go so that's no big loss. Sounds like you have it running pretty stable, any thoughts on how it performs? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nate H Posted January 29, 2009 Author Share Posted January 29, 2009 Did the wireless card work? I pretty much though audio would be a bust so I had planned on usb from the get go so that's no big loss. Sounds like you have it running pretty stable, any thoughts on how it performs? I never tried the wireless card. Gigabit ethernet works. I looked for drivers for it though didn't find any info on it. It runs stable and fast. I've got the q6600 in it so it performs well. I'm going to be doing 1080p playback over the network so, gigabit is a huge plus. The ipc distro seems rock solid. I've got a few other hackintosh's. One running retail leopard and the other running kalyway. This distro is much better than the kalyway. I know zotac just came out with a new itx mobo that is much faster and can have up to 8gb ram. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
newto2002 Posted April 16, 2009 Share Posted April 16, 2009 I never tried the wireless card. Gigabit ethernet works. I looked for drivers for it though didn't find any info on it. It runs stable and fast. I've got the q6600 in it so it performs well. I'm going to be doing 1080p playback over the network so, gigabit is a huge plus. The ipc distro seems rock solid. I've got a few other hackintosh's. One running retail leopard and the other running kalyway. This distro is much better than the kalyway. I know zotac just came out with a new itx mobo that is much faster and can have up to 8gb ram. Does your board work with a retail DVD disc (boot 123 method?) Do you think this other Zotac Board Zotac 610i would work? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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