Badger77 Posted September 26, 2009 Share Posted September 26, 2009 OK - in the last week or so I have been thinking about "hackintosh" and getting involved in my own build. I know a fair bit about macs, can do a little terminal stuff with direction and have built my own PC's so quite fancy this projects. Now three main questions. Firstly is there a "definitive" "most compatible" board to use. I ahve readt the 10.5 and 10.6 guides and the Gigabyte EP45 seems to be a favourite. I am not too worried about cost I just want the most compatible bit of hardware possible all round to give the easiest and trouble free build. Any other cards and memory etc that is highly recommended. Second - I want to use this machine as a backup machine. I can't afford a macpro to sit as a spare machine. So I am thinking I would like to install 10.5 client, 10.6 client and 10.6 server (possibly 10.5 server also). Once I have a 10.5 or 10.6 client installed is it easy to set a multiboot for other OS's - as I probably will put windows 7 when it is released also. I'll use this mac for testing etc also. Finally - I have seen chameleon mentioned and am presuming this is sort of a boot utility that you use to start up the "mac" then select the OS to use. Is this correct. I ahve seen the 10.6 vanilla PDF guide with chameleon. I will probably have 3 or 4 1TB drives in the build so shoudl I put it on another device. Just any basic answers would be good. I am prepared to read and get this going but thought I would get some early answers and kit advice before I go spend all my money then realise I stuffed up or can't do it. Thanks very much. Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/188990-newbie-and-server-multi-boot-questions/ Share on other sites More sharing options...
Badger77 Posted September 28, 2009 Author Share Posted September 28, 2009 Does anybody at all hqave any help, answers, advice or opinions on this ?? Am I in the right forum or should I post in anohter one as I see this is more of a sort fo "i've got a problem" forum. Be good to get some help as I am nervous just buying all the kit without knowing if what I want to do works. Thanks Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/188990-newbie-and-server-multi-boot-questions/#findComment-1282877 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Badger77 Posted September 28, 2009 Author Share Posted September 28, 2009 Just keeping alive see if anyone who can help sees it - Active boards - Post drops off first few pages REALLY quickly Thanks for any responses and guidance. Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/188990-newbie-and-server-multi-boot-questions/#findComment-1283232 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Badger77 Posted September 29, 2009 Author Share Posted September 29, 2009 Can ANYONE give any advice. Am I asking in wrong forum or just the wrong questions. ???? Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/188990-newbie-and-server-multi-boot-questions/#findComment-1284712 Share on other sites More sharing options...
schnogg Posted September 30, 2009 Share Posted September 30, 2009 OK - in the last week or so I have been thinking about "hackintosh" and getting involved in my own build. I know a fair bit about macs, can do a little terminal stuff with direction and have built my own PC's so quite fancy this projects. Now three main questions. Firstly is there a "definitive" "most compatible" board to use. I ahve readt the 10.5 and 10.6 guides and the Gigabyte EP45 seems to be a favourite. I am not too worried about cost I just want the most compatible bit of hardware possible all round to give the easiest and trouble free build. Any other cards and memory etc that is highly recommended. No there is not. This isn't called a PCintosh, its a Hackintosh: You have to hack it together yourself. You are going to want to read and research to find out what people have done that works and what doesn't work. I have the lifehacker setup and i'd say its 95%. I'm still working on getting the CPU recognized correctly. Second - I want to use this machine as a backup machine. I can't afford a macpro to sit as a spare machine. So I am thinking I would like to install 10.5 client, 10.6 client and 10.6 server (possibly 10.5 server also). The server version is largely like the client version. The big difference is that the server has a phone home validation feature. If you just want to run some services, you can do it wihout setting up SL server. Once I have a 10.5 or 10.6 client installed is it easy to set a multiboot for other OS's - as I probably will put windows 7 when it is released also. I'll use this mac for testing etc also. I'm not sure why people use windows, but I have heard that strange behavior happens with ACPI when you flip back and forth between windows and snow leopard. Finally - I have seen chameleon mentioned and am presuming this is sort of a boot utility that you use to start up the "mac" then select the OS to use. Is this correct. I ahve seen the 10.6 vanilla PDF guide with chameleon. Chameleon is basically a boot loader that emulates some of the efi magic that is built into apple macs. The newer versions do other cool stuff like inject codes and drivers into the kernel at boot time. The only reason to use 10.5 now is if something isn't supported in 10.6. With Chameleon, you can always boot into 32 bit mode by using arch=i386. Good luck. Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/188990-newbie-and-server-multi-boot-questions/#findComment-1284922 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Badger77 Posted September 30, 2009 Author Share Posted September 30, 2009 No there is not. This isn't called a PCintosh, its a Hackintosh: You have to hack it together yourself. You are going to want to read and research to find out what people have done that works and what doesn't work. I have the lifehacker setup and i'd say its 95%. I'm still working on getting the CPU recognized correctly. The server version is largely like the client version. The big difference is that the server has a phone home validation feature. If you just want to run some services, you can do it wihout setting up SL server. I'm not sure why people use windows, but I have heard that strange behavior happens with ACPI when you flip back and forth between windows and snow leopard. Chameleon is basically a boot loader that emulates some of the efi magic that is built into apple macs. The newer versions do other cool stuff like inject codes and drivers into the kernel at boot time. The only reason to use 10.5 now is if something isn't supported in 10.6. With Chameleon, you can always boot into 32 bit mode by using arch=i386. Good luck. Thanks for help. The phone home validation doesn't worry me from a legality point of view since I own every version but I guess that also means hardware validation ??? hence you mentioning it ?? I'll look into this some more to try and find what the best choice people seem to think is for motherboard. Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/188990-newbie-and-server-multi-boot-questions/#findComment-1285829 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts