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hackintosh or PC

spock999

Member
I still run my old 2008 Mac Pro and I did a lot of update but now the end is near in Pro tools my buffer is at 1024 so no playable Virtual instrument No USB 3 and also loosing a PCIe slot for a SATA III add on card and so on
I use a Apollo Firewire with not Thunderbolt card and 3 UAD PCIe card but one still in is box for lack of space. I love Mac in the studio but i'm a little scared of the hackintosh stability so everyday I go back and fort ... should I switch to PC and go full Windows 10 keeping the option of a Thunderbolt with a add on card and getting some nice SATA III USB 3 and more SPEED with 7th Gen I7 or go on the Dark side ... lol . I read a lot of threads of peoples running hackintosh with Thunderbolt card but when you ask for info on the Build stability report in a real working studio with paying client you get silence ... maybe they just Crash there system so they can't reply. Joke aside if you have comment or just to add your grain of salt please reply

The old 4.1 and 5.1 Mac Pro are way to pricy have no SATA III or Thunderbolt and for what I see will get there ass kick from the newer 7th and 8th gen i7 with half the core

Let me know if i'm wrong and make me a happy man

Have a nice day
 

slamthecrank

Hall of Fame Member
but when you ask for info on the Build stability report in a real working studio with paying client you get silence ...
There's a reason for that... and all jokes aside, for real.

If you are mostly concerned with stability and how dependably things are going to work with paying clients in a working studio, I think you already know the answer.
 

YYR123

Established Member
Hacks are great, but they take too much tweaking for myself....maybe I’m just too old for it.

I ran one for several years and it worked great without issue , but come upgrade your software time and it could destroy your build

I sold a 2012 6-Core and went with a Win10PRO build.

I7-6850k
M.2 drive (Amazing)
And built in TB to the mobo....(I have yet to use it) I run HDX presently no plans for a TB interface nor add on.

Asus X99 Deluxe ii

M.2 drives are literally amazing.....
 

severe

Active Member
The way I see it, and I’ve run a hackintosh laptop in the past; not for recording and mixing but for shits and giggles, why introduce any possibility to run into issues?

I’m not sure what the current methods are to run macOS on a PC, but there were some drawbacks with updating the OS when I was running mine.

With all the software/driver updates etc to keep in check as it is, with just your standard Mac or PC, why bother?

My advice would be to choose the computer that fits the bill. If it’s a PC, take the time to learn Windows. It’s worked for me. Also, the software you run is virtually the same once running on either platform.
 

jonnytheshirt

Established Member
Depends on the production environment, professionally the answer is simple stability. Hackintosh has no place there, its unsupported, unsupportable and unlicensed.

If its a project studio and you've time and like to tinker and learn, hack's fine if that's the way you'd like to go - hardware's certainly cheaper.

There's no longer any particularly huge drawbacks switching to Windows, I know a lot have over the past few years of Apples shenanighans, however sounds like you like Mac - its solid on UAD. That 2008 unit has served you well.

I'd suggest either simply going Windows or Mac not Hack.
 

JamesNorth

Hall of Fame Member
I’ve been running a Hackintosh in a busy environment pretty much since it was possible to do it. There was a massive hole in the Mac Pro release schedule and I took the plunge.

You need to know the drawbacks and be good at building computers etc, but it’s not by any stretch unstable.

I can’t remember the last time I had a computer issue at the studio, in fact. It’d be 5 years or more.

Upgrading major hardware is simply a case of doing a Time Machine backup of your installation, doing a new installation on your new build and restoring from that backup.

Upgrading OS point releases has been possible for a few years now without issue.

Stick to Gigabyte boards would be my main advice.
 

spock999

Member
I did a Hackintosh build before I bought the Real Mac Pro 2008 that was almost 10 years ago it was a lot of fun/pain but I was a younger man then. I already have the Case, PSU, SSD so all I need is the CPU, Mobo, Cooling and the Memory. Since I didn`t find any successful report on 8th Gen CPU and 370 Chipset Mobo I will go for 7th gen and Gigabyte look like a winner, I`m a Asus guy myself but I know that Gigabyte is also a descent Cie.
This what I got so far, keep in mind that I will go Full PC but with the option to switch Hackintosh if I grow a pair or loose my mind whatever come first.

Gigabyte Ga-z270mx-gaming 5 LGA1151 Intel Z270 SLI Micro ATX DDR4
Gigabyte Gc-alpine Ridge 3 x Dual Thunderbolt Dp1.2 40 Go/s Retail
Corsair Watercooling - Series H55 (CW-9060010-WW)
Corsair Vengeance LPX 32 GB (2 x 16GB) 3200 MHz 288-Pin DDR4 DRAM C16 Memory Kit, Black (CMK32GX4M2B3200C16)
Intel Core i7–7700 K (Bx80677i77700 K)

I go for Watercooling to keep noise to a minimum but there will be no overclocking and since it`s a 100% music rig I will stick with the inboard GPU

Again any comment will be greatly apreciated
 

JamesNorth

Hall of Fame Member
I did a Hackintosh build before I bought the Real Mac Pro 2008 that was almost 10 years ago it was a lot of fun/pain but I was a younger man then. I already have the Case, PSU, SSD so all I need is the CPU, Mobo, Cooling and the Memory. Since I didn`t find any successful report on 8th Gen CPU and 370 Chipset Mobo I will go for 7th gen and Gigabyte look like a winner, I`m a Asus guy myself but I know that Gigabyte is also a descent Cie.
This what I got so far, keep in mind that I will go Full PC but with the option to switch Hackintosh if I grow a pair or loose my mind whatever come first.

Gigabyte Ga-z270mx-gaming 5 LGA1151 Intel Z270 SLI Micro ATX DDR4
Gigabyte Gc-alpine Ridge 3 x Dual Thunderbolt Dp1.2 40 Go/s Retail
Corsair Watercooling - Series H55 (CW-9060010-WW)
Corsair Vengeance LPX 32 GB (2 x 16GB) 3200 MHz 288-Pin DDR4 DRAM C16 Memory Kit, Black (CMK32GX4M2B3200C16)
Intel Core i7–7700 K (Bx80677i77700 K)

I go for Watercooling to keep noise to a minimum but there will be no overclocking and since it`s a 100% music rig I will stick with the inboard GPU

Again any comment will be greatly apreciated
My setup is a 270 Gigabyte with Alpine Ridge card as well - works perfectly with 4 UAD devices. The pro tip with UAD stuff though is that they must be powered up *just after* boot (at the BIOS screen) and not before. I discovered this by accident.

Some motherboards cause more issues than others - I bought a Z270X-UD3 board because I saw so many reports of it working well over at tonymacx86.com.

I'm not sure about that one and can't help you - but I can tell you that everything functions as it should with the UD3 and the Alpine Ridge card.

You can in fact get 370 boards to work perfectly well, but it's nowhere near as well documented, so not worth it.

Find a good guide for your mobo on tonymacx86.com and you'll be cool.
 

mikula

Member
I am a demanding user and building hacks for about 8 years now and can say that they’re Just as rock solid as native macs. It all depends on your hack knowledge and your patience configuring them. Which was a lot harder back in the days than now. I’d say stick to known working configs when you start fiddling with hacks.
I use a gigabyte z170x designare with Sierra high. My thunderbolt uad performs rock solid
https://www.tonymacx86.com/threads/...designare-6700k-hd530-tb3-960-evo-m-2.213113/
 

spock999

Member
BIG Thanks for all your reply, i`m sure this thread is gonna help a lot of people

It`s like i`m stock between a rock and a hard place the z170x support 6th and 7th gen but you need to go z370 for 8th gen and the 8700k as 6 core 12 threads for about 50$ more.
Someone got to byte the bullet and do a coffee lake ... I can always got for it and if the hackintosh don`t pan out stay PC until someone get it right.

Do we have people on the Thread that run a studio with a PC running Windows 10 ? maybe we can get somme of your comments

Thanks again and have a nice day
 
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JamesNorth

Hall of Fame Member
There are heaps of Coffee Lake systems running - just have a read on Tony Mac.

270 is very easy to get running - my install took about 5 min longer than a normal OS X install because I had to copy a few files to the install stick. No configuration required.
 

NEWRIGEL

Active Member
I’ve had both and my Macs are still going strong... the PC parts in the hacks are spent. I have 20 year old Macs that still work perfectly but not one 20 year old PC...
 

FreemanB

New Member
I’ve had both and my Macs are still going strong... the PC parts in the hacks are spent. I have 20 year old Macs that still work perfectly but not one 20 year old PC...
That's just anecdotal evidence, bro. Doesn't mean anything. What could you do with a 20 year old machine anyway? If you're willing to spend a bit more, go with Mac. If not, go with PC. That's what it boils down to.
 

Bear-Faced Cow

Hall of Fame Member
That's just anecdotal evidence, bro. Doesn't mean anything. What could you do with a 20 year old machine anyway? If you're willing to spend a bit more, go with Mac. If not, go with PC. That's what it boils down to.
Sorry, but it's far from anecdotal and it doesn't boil down to how much you want to spend as far as which camp you decide upon. Hacks require time, and often effort, in order to get working to the relative equivalence of a Mac.

Way too many people boil it all down to which camp one should be on. Regardless of which camp one chooses, when it comes to an audio workstation environment, one should be focusing on the infrastructure, and that does require appropriate funding. Way too often, too many people expect champagne performance on a beer budget.

jord
 

NEWRIGEL

Active Member

TonyVO

Member
I’ve had both and my Macs are still going strong... the PC parts in the hacks are spent. I have 20 year old Macs that still work perfectly but not one 20 year old PC...
Define "going strong" ... not much PPC software around these days.... I have at least three macintosh doors stops, including CRT iMacs (the first ones), anglepoise iMacs, an old G4 tower, and an old G5 tower, and finally a PowerMac Intel Cheese greater. The cheese grater is now 10 years old and gets used occasionally for VEP duties to take some load off of my kontakt sessions, which could easily be done with a cheap PC... so yeah... let's talk about expensive door stops. My hackintosh on the other hand, can be upgraded incrementally and affordably, new graphics a few months from now (yay triple 4K monitors), motherboard and CPU in a year (Yay more M.2 NVMe slots and faster machine) .... so yeah... let's talk obsolescence.
 

YYR123

Established Member
Yeah this whole thread started to go sideways awhile back....the old Mac vrs Windows debate is so tired....


For example-what about the people who have both Mac and Win machines?
Like myself
Am I supposed to argue with myself?

No it’s a boring conversation

I believe this thread is over
 
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