i3 system powerful?

[jim]

any £20 discreet graphics card

Discrete?

Sorry, I know I'm being a pedant

[scaryjim]

Discrete?

Probably: I can spell, but some words get in my blind spot

[Tinlau]

Thanks. Will do a bit more research. It would be so easy if he just bought a Mac!!!

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Anyway,I still think to get OS X up and running the OP should try to replicate the hardware used on existing Core2 based Macs as close as possible.

[Pob255]

The Mac Mini uses a Nvidia chipset so I would probably look at getting a motherboard which has the 9300/730i chipset.

not All of them, the one we have runs off an intel chipset, (i945gm I seem to remember)

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

not All of them, the one we have runs off an intel chipset, (i945gm I seem to remember)

The latest ones do have it and you must remember Apple does have a habit of discontinuing support of the latest versions of OS X for older hardware every few years.

[golwg]

Well, talked to him earlier and he said he would like to have a cheap graphics card but not mine!!! The cheeky git!

Anyway, looks like he would prefer an i5 750 now!! He said that he might have a project coming up in August where he has to do some animation / rendering for a small advert he is doing so thinks the I5 750 would be a better bet.

So, good guys of Hexus, what mobo, ram should i (You) select for the i5 750, and 4 gig ram and a cheap enough GPU that will play games but he is not fussy about all the bells and whistles!

Thanks for your continued advice and patience.

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

For work I would get him one of these:

http://store.apple.com/uk/product/FC...-GoogleBase-UK



OR

http://www.studentcomputers.co.uk/Product/id/688880




For gaming I would get him one of these:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Microsoft-Xb...5740831&sr=1-4






Moose attempts to run away quickly but gets confused and runs in wrong direction!!


A suitable list of bits was listed in post three of this thread.

[golwg]

Thanks, seen that earlier but any cheaper motherboards / ram plus what about a GPU?

Mac mini is too much for him! He is a tight git at the best of times. I remember once he got his wife to buy herself a birthday card while he waited in the car outside the shop!!

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Thanks, seen that earlier but any cheaper motherboards / ram plus what about a GPU?

Mac mini is too much for him! He is a tight git at the best of times. I remeber once he got his wife to buy herself a birthday card while he waited in the car outside the shop!!

You could probably get the bits closer to £300:

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/172755

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/174499

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/179278

I would also check Scan and Novatech too.

What about the cost of getting OS X then??

You may want to buy a Ferrari but if you only have a total of 2 pence in your possession it is not going to happen!!

TBH,if I was in your situation I would probably not do the build. If it were a Windows based one then it would be OK but since this is a Hackintosh it is not guaranteed that it will be bug free at all especially with hardware current Macs do not use.

Also any updates to OS X or the next OS X release may potentially cause problems too.

What are you going to do then??

I assume you would have to be on 24/7 call out spending hours taking care of any issues.

[golwg]

No, he has a brand new Windows 7 for me to install. He wants me to try Hackintosh on a seperate partition.

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

The bits I listed come to around £300. H55 and P55 motherboards cost from around £65 to £70 onwards. I would look on Ebay if you want to make significant savings on the hardware costs.

A basic graphics card will be about £20 and one for playing any recent games would be around £50 to £60.

OS X 10.6 Retail is about £25 to £30.

Basically you are looking at around £350 to £400.

[peterb]

Fixed

The Hexus chainsaw massacre

[golwg]

Thanks Cat.

[jim]

The Hexus chainsaw massacre

Very good

[LaxBlade]

Waw, where did you get your info? The Beano or Dandy?

Ok, Typo....

the i3 has only 2 Real (Physical) Core's and 2 two simulated (Ghost) cores...

Now the other New so called (i5) Core's which are based on the same architecture as the (i3) Clarkedale Design (are really i3 CPU's given an i5 badge.)

Know there is only 2 geniune i5 Lynnfield chips realised so far, the the i5 750 and i5 750s, (that I'm aware off, both have the Lynnfield architecture not the 32nm Clarkedale architecture as model'd on the core i3. (please check this out)....

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/185938

That's why I say the new i5's with the 32nm Clarkedale architecture, are really high performance i3 chips, given the (i5 Name) to help justify the £219.74inc. vat price Tag, for the highest price Intel Core i5 670 3.46GHz Socket 1156 4MB L3 Cache

which has the (i3) 2 Real (Physical) Core's and 2 two simulated (Ghost) cores... otherwise known as Intel i3 Dual Core CPU's with Hyper threading....

Know YES! I am aware - intel has classified this Core (i5) 670 3.46GHz an (i5) really more for clever marketing purposes only, when the real deal is:= i5 750 2.66Ghz 4 Physical cores 4 Real Cores with Intel Turbo 3.2Ghz can be easily overclocked on any decent Mobo to a safe stable "24hr overclock" of 4Ghz, however, many enthusiasts are squeezing 4.2Ghz with a high performance cooler, and Gigabyte UD4, UD5, UD6 Mobo or MSI GD65 or GD80 mobo... have all been confirmed with a little research on the net.

I challenge anyone to tell me the Core i5 670 3.46GHz Socket 1156 4MB L3 Cache BEATS the much lower priced, i5 750 2.66Ghz Socket 1156 8MB L3 Cache.??? taking into account any overclocked benchmark with the i5 750 clocked to 4Ghz or more....

Remember the i5 750 costs a mere £145-£150, and the i5 670 £219.74 - £230 Quid. What is the most logical Bang for Buck, & Value for money CPU, being completely honest with yourself, and not trying to bash ME.

All non-haters are welcome to reply with their argument. - cheers!