zimba42 Posted July 25, 2006 Share Posted July 25, 2006 I tried to filter all the hardware compatibility informations from the wiki but i failed :-) I simply want to build a cheap but smooth running AMD based OSX box. Please suggest some well working components or combinations. What i think to know right now: CPU: Socket 754 Athlon64 (Venice) or Sempron64 with SSE3 support Maimboard: no Nforce, but what else? Network: a cheap Pro/100 or 8139 card (because onboard NICs are not supported) Sound: ??? Graphics: ATI x1600 (or maybe x1300.. thats cheaper) ..anything else? Harddisk: PATA drive/controller (to avoid SATA problems) Mouse/Keyboard: ??? Many thanks... zimba42 Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/22655-suggestion-wanted-a-cheap-amd-based-osxx86-box/ Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dacotah Posted July 28, 2006 Share Posted July 28, 2006 Here is a possibility... an Acer Aspire T135. I just bought two of them for work, and played around with one for awhile. The motherboard is a Gigabyte GA-K8VT800M, which happens to be the same mobo I have in my home computer. It has a Sempron 3100 w/ SSE3, DVDRW, 512mb, 160Gb SATA, onboard audio, video, lan, card reader. They were $349 through PC Connection. You may have to trade the SATA for a PATA with someone as I didn't have any luck installing to that. 10.4.6 Jas installed without a hitch to the PATA, onboard LAN and video worked with audio on one channel. The video was pretty slow, though. I transferred the hd to my home machine and onboard networking didn't want to work on my motherboard even though they are the same thing as far as I can tell, both ver2. I added an Intel Pro 100 which is working great. I also have a GeForce 4 in there now which is a big improvement, and a FX5200 on the way to bump it up a bit more. Right now running 1152x864x32@75 with the GeForce 4. Still pretty cheap, though. SATA works as I can access the two existing SATA drives in that machine. The AC97 patch fixed audio, not the full patch but just the directory patch. USB works, but I had to install with a PS2 mouse. I guess I haven't tried the mouse on USB yet, but my USB drives work on at least the back four ports. I also did the AMD upgrade to 10.4.7 which went flawlessly. OSX is fast and very stable on this setup as I haven't had one single crash. I have been using it exclusively the last few days. Very happy so far. Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/22655-suggestion-wanted-a-cheap-amd-based-osxx86-box/#findComment-151195 Share on other sites More sharing options...
skyfox Posted July 31, 2006 Share Posted July 31, 2006 If you want fully supported video (with QE/CI and no tearing) on an AMD system you're also going to have to invest in an ATI X1600/X1800/X1900 graphics card. Or, you could get an Intel system with onboard GMA900/950 graphics. Currently, those are the only systems that provide flawless video. Mr. Jobs is probably going to annouce new Intel desktop Mac's in a week at WWDC. Those will likely provide support for a greater number of graphics chipsets, as Powermac's have had an Nvidia option for years. I would recommend waiting a little while longer before purchasing anything. The list of what's supported might get much longer after Aug. 7th. Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/22655-suggestion-wanted-a-cheap-amd-based-osxx86-box/#findComment-152786 Share on other sites More sharing options...
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