plan9 Posted January 13, 2007 Share Posted January 13, 2007 (edited) Hi, just another newb looking to build a system. I've used Debian on the desktop for several years now and I'm looking to try OSX86. I hope this is the right forum? I'm not a hardware guy but I've read/googled quite a lot. E6600 seems to be the clearly the best bang for buck at the moment when overclocked. I'm going to use air cooling and intend to go to ~3.4GHz with Zalman 9500. RAM is also a no brainer: 2x1GB PC6400. Undecided on brand, probably OCZ or Corsair. Graphics card will be some Geforce pci-e 7xxx, probably 7600GT. So long as I can do dual head @ 1920x1440, I don't mind. I like WD SATA Caviars for drives and I don't imagine they will be an issue for OSX. If I have to get a SATA optical drive, I will. The motherboard has given me a lot of pause. I've googled/searched this forum and I think Asus P5W DH Deluxe is the best way to go, even if I'm not going to be able to get great sound (I have an SB Audigy too but that isn't even supported). Does that sound 'ok' as a base? All I want a system that I can upgrade to quadcore and has 4+ hard drives (intend to use RAID-10 on boot partition). Software wise, I intend to run Leopard and Parallels. Having 1920x1440 dual-head is pretty essential. Edited January 13, 2007 by plan9 Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/38489-e6600-motherboard/ Share on other sites More sharing options...
limini Posted January 13, 2007 Share Posted January 13, 2007 Hi plan9, I was very lucky: I only found out about x86 a week ago, just as Jas 10.4.8 came out. I built my system a month ago without any consideration for it and it turned out to be perfect for x86 (my deepest and heartfelt thanks to all of you who have relentlessly toiled through 2006 to make it happen!). I didn't use any of the drives in a RAID config, which also may have helped. E6600@2.97 stock cooler(plenty fast)/P5W DH/2gig Corsair 6400/Asus 7600GT Silent/Seagate SATA drives My only problem is audio. While it works in general and appears in the preferences, it doesn't appear in "About this mac" and nor does it work with gband. So far I've found the P5W DH works really well. What I don't like about the P5W DH is the odd use of the SI controller for "EZ-BACKUP" which I don't use (it splits the chipset's SATA channel one secondary connector into 2 for chip-supported RAID use), the fact that the native 975 only supports 4 SATA channels, the hard to configure wifi and pretty useless remote. The audio applet usage is also quite unclear, lacking in documentation (which basically just tells you what controls are named - wow...). If I was to rebuild, I would seriously consider paying more for the higher end 965 workstation motherboards (P5W64, P5WDG2), BUT I don't know if the system would be as compatible with x86. BTW: we're lucky that someone worked on Nvidia compatability: seems to me the entire Intel Mac line is running on ATI. I've had no problems with my 7600GT (including dual monitors), but I would search this forum to see if an ATI card wouldn't be a better choice. Bear in mind that this is now: OSX will soon mutate, and all this "compatability" may disappear in puff of logic Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/38489-e6600-motherboard/#findComment-275094 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Soündless Posted January 13, 2007 Share Posted January 13, 2007 Hi, just another newb looking to build a system. I've used Debian on the desktop for several years now and I'm looking to try OSX86. I hope this is the right forum? I'm not a hardware guy but I've read/googled quite a lot. E6600 seems to be the clearly the best bang for buck at the moment when overclocked. I'm going to use air cooling and intend to go to ~3.4GHz with Zalman 9500. RAM is also a no brainer: 2x1GB PC6400. Undecided on brand, probably OCZ or Corsair. Graphics card will be some Geforce pci-e 7xxx, probably 7600GT. So long as I can do dual head @ 1920x1440, I don't mind. I like WD SATA Caviars for drives and I don't imagine they will be an issue for OSX. If I have to get a SATA optical drive, I will. The motherboard has given me a lot of pause. I've googled/searched this forum and I think Asus P5W DH Deluxe is the best way to go, even if I'm not going to be able to get great sound (I have an SB Audigy too but that isn't even supported). Does that sound 'ok' as a base? All I want a system that I can upgrade to quadcore and has 4+ hard drives (intend to use RAID-10 on boot partition). Software wise, I intend to run Leopard and Parallels. Having 1920x1440 dual-head is pretty essential. you cant run paralells on a hackintosh at this moment. but this is a good system Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/38489-e6600-motherboard/#findComment-275113 Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gorosh Posted January 13, 2007 Share Posted January 13, 2007 If I was to rebuild, I would seriously consider paying more for the higher end 965 workstation motherboards (P5W64, P5WDG2), BUT I don't know if the system would be as compatible with x86. Actually those motherboards are 975X too, not P965. Yes, those are also nice boards. For Conroe Hackintosh I'd recommmend either P5W dH Deluxe or Intel Bad Axe 2. I have P5W DH and it works great with 10.8.4 - install was extremly easy, I practically haven't touched Terminal window, and everything works now. I don't have experience with Bad Axe 2, but I suppose it works ok too. As for graphic card, I'd definitewly recommend nVidia 7xxx series card. Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/38489-e6600-motherboard/#findComment-275120 Share on other sites More sharing options...
limini Posted January 13, 2007 Share Posted January 13, 2007 you cant run paralells on a hackintosh at this moment. but this is a good system You are most definitely wrong about this Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/38489-e6600-motherboard/#findComment-275342 Share on other sites More sharing options...
tuxuser33 Posted January 14, 2007 Share Posted January 14, 2007 I can confirm Parallels is running perfectly under 10.4.8 My MB is Intel D945GCL, CPU Intel 6300. Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/38489-e6600-motherboard/#findComment-275392 Share on other sites More sharing options...
sg Posted January 14, 2007 Share Posted January 14, 2007 parallels and vmware work great on my hackintosh. i think the issue might of been that the VTx virtualization technology in core duos was required at one point which isnt in every intel CPU or even AMDs. Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/38489-e6600-motherboard/#findComment-275402 Share on other sites More sharing options...
ntsmkfob Posted January 14, 2007 Share Posted January 14, 2007 you cant run paralells on a hackintosh at this moment. but this is a good system Don't tell me that! I've been running Parallels on my AsRock P4Dual 915GL for months, with 10.4.7, both with a P4 Northwood (SSE2) and a P4 Prescott with SSE3. I now have it running on the Jas 1048 SSE2/SSE3 DVD on the same mobo. It definitely won't work on an AMD processor (won't even install). Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/38489-e6600-motherboard/#findComment-275664 Share on other sites More sharing options...
plan9 Posted January 14, 2007 Author Share Posted January 14, 2007 Thanks for the responses And I think Parallels does work on AMD from my searching but that might be out of date by now. limini: Those other 975 boards look good but I have no idea what the hackintosh support on them is like. I think I'll stick with the P5W DH unless someone else tests OSX86 on them first. Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/38489-e6600-motherboard/#findComment-275882 Share on other sites More sharing options...
ntsmkfob Posted January 15, 2007 Share Posted January 15, 2007 Thanks for the responses And I think Parallels does work on AMD from my searching but that might be out of date by now. limini: Those other 975 boards look good but I have no idea what the hackintosh support on them is like. I think I'll stick with the P5W DH unless someone else tests OSX86 on them first. That looks worth trying. Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/38489-e6600-motherboard/#findComment-276510 Share on other sites More sharing options...
powrslave Posted January 16, 2007 Share Posted January 16, 2007 i'm running vista in parallels on a san diego Link to comment https://www.insanelymac.com/forum/topic/38489-e6600-motherboard/#findComment-276987 Share on other sites More sharing options...
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