I have no moral objection to it and I totally understand the motivation. Apple is completely failing to provide hardware that runs at a fraction of the performance you'd get from building a commodity $2500 AMD/Nvidia desktop even if you give Apple $7000 for a Pro model. Apple's platform especially sucks if you do anything with deep learning since they refuse to sell anything with Nvidia GPUs anymore.
But the actual experience of running a Hackintosh is terrible. Even if you buy exactly the right components, it will still take you days to get everything patched and working perfectly. And then every minor security patch will completely break your system, so you end up never updating. Finally you hit a point where your system is so far behind that you give up and either buy a Mac or just install Linux/Windows.
If you are using the computer to do paid work and can't gamble like on every update, I think you'd be crazy to use a hackintosh. But if it works for you, sweet.
Two people can both buy "the right parts" according to the site's myriad recommendations but randomly choose slightly different combinations of motherboards or video cards or wifi cards or whatever and have wildly different experiences overall with updates.
[1] https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/mac-pro-cpu-compatibili... [2] http://www.macvidcards.com/i-want-the-best-graphics-card-for...
However, picking the correct hardware and figuring out the necessary basics is a challenge in itself. You need patience and technical knowledge. So it is far from going into the store and purchasing an iMac. That is certain. But it is not as dark as you are putting it, IMHO.
The only reasonable thing to do was to dedicate the machine to gaming on Windows and buy a Mac. Not trying this again anytime soon.
Updates up until 10.13.6 worked seamlessly, only "hack" you had to do was change out the WiFi card.
The Macbook hardware is pretty excellent, and prices are comparable to the (few) competitors of similar quality. In absolute terms, they are not outside the range that their market can afford.
It is only in desktops, or, more precisely, workstations that Apple's offerings fall short.
This encouraged me even further to run Linux as my daily driver. Without a hackintosh, I might be stuck in overpriced, un-upgradeable Apple land.
Instead, I completely made the switch: got a 300$ fully decked ThinkPad x230 with 16gb ram and an IPS screen, running Ubuntu + i3, and the former hackintosh is now on server duty. I'm finally apple free :)
So I highly recommend hackintoshes as a stepping stone to leaving Apple!
My 2013 Macbook Pro retina will be at this point in the fall with two major upgrades uninstallable. I'd say this argument no longer holds because even the official hardware often can't be upgraded. I would be shocked if the next OSX version doesn't fail to upgrade like the one from last fall. That new filesystem breaks everything. Thankfully I had backups, but even attempting again is not worth losing a day to Apple's shitty software. OSX Used to be the one piece of software that was solid. Now there is no Apple software I use that is solid except old versions of OSX <= 10.12.x
/Applications/Install\ macOS\ High\ Sierra.app/Contents/Resources/startosinstall --converttoapfs NOI look at it another way. Apple, as a company is failing to meet the needs of some of its users:
- You can’t get an upgradable pro machine
- you can’t get a good keyboard (for some definitions of good)
- macOS gets more iOS-ified with each release and some people don’t like that
Every Hackintosh continues to add momentum to that platform ecosystem, enriching it so that Apple can continue on more or less as they want.
I use Linux (and OpenBSD occasionally) these days, and I do so in part so that I can sometimes be the guy who sands off a rough corner or two. Even by using the platform and occasionally submitting bug reports, you’re enriching a platform that may be the last un-nerfed general purpose computing platform standing. If we lose general purpose computing to a world of app-store enabled iPad Pros and Windows Store-locked Surfaces, we will have lost something important I think.
The content companies had giant advertising campaigns trying to brand this as "theft" or "stealing". Of course, when they sued someone they used the proper term: "IP violation"
I'm not arguing if it's acceptable or not, but it's not the same as theft which leaves the owner without the item.
Look at it this way if I steal your trade secrets and clone your product after you spent R&D money on it I’ve essentially “stolen” both a part of your revenue and your investment.
Music, film and games cost money to develop and produce pirating them does incur a financial penalty and that does fall under the common definition of theft.
However as far as Apple goes if you buy a copy of their OS you can easily consider that acceptable since EULA restrictions on the usage can be ethically counter argued.
I really hope you're not right about this, but unfortunately it seems all too likely. Linux will finally win on the desktop not because it finally starts listening to potential users and making things better, but because everyone else just stops making desktops.
Of course those of us on this site are members of the Hacker Class. Putting our own house in order might involve writing code, but meaninful contributions can come in the form of bug reports or even just using software and occasionally writing something about how you use it.
Also, the font color on this blog is absolutely horrible.
Yeah, I've noticed more sites do this. Super annoying. I made this bookmark for those cases:
javascript:(()=>{document.querySelectorAll("p,div,article,section,ul,ol,li").forEach(x=>{x.style["color"]="black";});})();I don’t find the “theft” argument compelling, because Apple doesn’t even sell OSX anymore. They’re a hardware company.
You mean like, a PS/2 keyboard or what are you on about? Any bluetooth or usb keyboard works on any regular mac.
> - macOS gets more iOS-ified with each release and some people don’t like that
Again, what are you on about? A hackintosh is running a just as ios-ivied macOS as a regular mac.
I believe GP refers to the crapboards in the recent MacBook Pro lineup, which are amazingly bad. Also, IIRC Apple doesn't offer a real wired keyboard anymore.
>I look at it another way. Apple, as a company is failing to meet the needs of some of its users:
I don't see how the two perspectives are related, unless you think a company failing to meet your needs as a consumer is a valid reason to steal from said company.
Absolutely. Here, here.
I don't feel a moral obligation not to steal from Apple. I'm not sure I could steal (and use) an amount from them that would impact them at all. I mean even if I stole a classroom full of MacBook pro's in order to give free programming classes - it's not like it would affect Apple in any meaningful way.
But I don't quite get why anyone would go out of their way to get hw they'll never be able to run legally licensed os on. For fun and learning, sure. Turn your linux/bsd box into a hackintosh by dual booting. But you can never do any work on it without risk. So what's the point?
Sure you can "buy" a copy of os x - but you only get install media and a license to run on Apple hw.
How does running the same software on a different machine do anything to address this?
If I wanted to go back to seeing my operating system as a hobby then Linux would be mostly a better option.
For the more "power users" who prefer to customise things to a fine degree and make particular choices a typical user doesn't want/need, Apple products aren't always the right option.
window management:
Turn off all the window edge snapping. Put up with single pixel borders, windows not saving their monitor, size and position. Put up with the single tab at the top of the window eating up screen space. Put up with a few other minor annoyances due to bugs in Xfce.
make keybindings the same in all apps:
alias x='/usr/bin/setxkbmap -option ctrl:swap_lalt_lctl'
Uninstall a lot of other crap I don't need or want. I should switch to another leaner distro (ie. no systemd), but it has taken a lot of effort to get to a system that works well for my needs despite all my preferences from using Mac OS X for so long. I don't think I could use a more recent version of what is now macos.
My new company is a Windows shop, and I'm actually finding it surprisingly pleasant—to the point that I'm seriously considering using Windows 10 full-time for personal use as well. I don't come to this decision lightly: I'd been anti-"M$" for a number of years, to the point of writing a paper in high school advocating for them to be broken up (back around year 2000).
Looking at the trajectory of recent OS releases from my experience:
- Linux: Still tends to lag behind a bit in hardware compatibility (as is expected), but quite pleasant to use—especially when staying on the stable/LTS releases.
- MacOS: Not sure if I can identify the last release that actually made my life easier.
- Windows: I see a fair amount of real innovation, and they seem committed to reducing paper cuts.
If you care about privacy and control, Win10 introduces many, many paper cuts.
And I do not consider spending a weekend (or longer) to get my sound chip working fun any more. I am too old for that stuff. Maybe I just have a lucky hand picking hardware, but except for the nVidia driver, hardware has just worked(tm) for me.
Don't get me wrong, if you are happy on macOS, by all means, enjoy it. But the old cliche that getting hardware to work on GNU/Linux is not true these days.
But I do agree, macOS without the tight integration between hardware and OS seems pointless.
That's only true if you make a point of buying hardware you already know there's linux drivers for. I work with a few headless linux boxes, but not a GUI. Every year or two I try a distribution or two on whatever hardware I have, hit a problem, sigh after reading through numberless blog/SO/reddit posts contradicting each other on what's possible, and abandon the attempt.
I have a 2018 Dell XPS 15. From what I've read, there's only an 'experimental' (ugh) driver for the fingerprint scanner. To switch between integrated/GPU graphics, you have to log in and out (or you don't - depending on who you read). Not sure about the touchscreen, but I can't summon the motivation to find out. So much depends on fiddling, experimenting, and reading. I'd rather go for a run, and put up with Windows (which I loathe, but loathing seems to be a precondition of computer use in 2018).
The first few months with Linux were fun as I played around and discovered what I could and couldn't do to wreck an install. Zero hardware-related problems.
And then I put multi distros on this generic i-5 box. And left them alone. Zero cares for years. All hardware covered. Xubuntu 18.04 boots from my SSD in under 5 seconds.
I suppose you might have given up at just the time all those problems were going away.
Stick with one of the Ubuntu flavors, or Linux Mint, or MX17, and the likelihood, these days, is that there'll be few problems. Unless, of course, Linux won't run some needed software.
Also mac gui thing is bit more stable than linux windows managers but after a time it will manifest bugs that you will only be able to get rid of by fresh install of the whole system.
Also don't be surprised when you copy folder onto the folder of same name. If source folder has less files then target one, the files missing in source will get deleted from target. On Mac sometimes copy means delete.
Parent comment was simply saying that macOS on Apple hardware doesn't require maintenance, and if the poster was interested in an OS that did then Linux would be better than macOS on a Hackintosh.
Some things I ran into on a daily basis:
* GPU support (at least with Nvidia) is terrible. Anything GPU-bound was absolutely horrendous. The OS would just freeze and reboot itself a dozen times a day due to the GPU (and not obviously e.g. overheating issues). No issues at all when running Windows on the same box. And this was after I spent hours trawling forum posts and fiddling around with kexts and patches and installing random tools off GitHub that would let you downgrade from the latest Nvidia drivers to the last "known good" ones. This didn't used to be as bad, but High Sierra really fucked things over.
* I never got non-Bluetooth audio working. The community recommended a USB audio adapter; never worked for me. I'd occasionally connect AirPods, but not having proper support for the fast device switching meant it was a pain in the ass.
* iMessage worked... maybe 30-40% of the time? Switching over to my new Mac, I'm amazed how I'd trained myself away from sending text messages on my Mac purely because I didn't expect it to work reliably.
* Other little things didn't work that you wouldn't reasonably expect to work. Apple Pay in Safari via your phone, unlocking your computer with an Apple Watch, remote iOS debugging in Xcode / Safari, etc. Little things that I didn't really notice at the time, but are so much nicer now that I'm back in first-party hardware land.
I'm glad I did the experiment, and I'm glad I still have my custom box lying around for Windows gaming, but man am I happy to be back on first-party hardware. If I needed to switch back to using my tower as my primary computer, I'd definitely use Linux or Windows before going back to a Hackintosh.
The biggest appeal of Apple is their wonderful hardware. I dislike MacOS and it has been worse over the last years.
It seems to me that a Hackintosh is the worst of both worlds. If you spend that much time hacking around the hardware anyways, why not use Linux ?
As much as I try to maintain a fair and balanced point of view, that is a pretty low standard to meet. I work as a sysadmin at a windows shop (~75 clients), and I regularly have to deal with stuff that would make run away screaming if my trusty old GNU/Linux desktop gave me that kind of trouble. Handling updates for Windows alone is enough to send grown women and men into hysterical laughter. And then you look at license management for their server software, and you think you must have fallen asleep and woken up in some Kafkaesque nightmare[0].
[0] I am told vendors like SAP or Oracle are much worse. But still, Microsoft's licensing schemes are pretty ____ing insane.
Oh and I also made the mistake of going from Final Cut 7 to Final Cut X. To be fair, I did edit two complete videos before going back to 7 and eventually ditching Final Cut entirely. FCX is terrible.
Shortly after I started running Linux in a VM and got into i3/tiling window managers. Every iteration of macOS has gotten worse and worse.
If you really like macOS, then maybe it's worth it to run a hackintosh. I run Win 10 for games and video editing and Linux for absolutely everything else.
Frankly, I can get the same or better hardware in a Thinkpad, which was designed with actual users in mind rather than aesthetics, is more durable, has better battery life, still has a real keyboard, is still upgradeable and repairable, and also for less money.
I have loved Macs all my life, but they have been coasting hard on reputation over delivery for awhile now.
I must be neckbearding, because from an objective standpoint, it doesn't make any damn sense. Swappable batteries (on some models), universally better keyboards (at the very least, more robust!), usually far cheaper for far better internals, ability to swap hardware out, before-market and after-market customization options...
This whole "but it just works" thing doesn't make sense to me, because my latest job gave me a macbook pro and it didn't "just work" - desktop config was weird (fullscreen opens in some random ass place and desktop locations were completely randomly assigned), nothing was configurable like I wanted, I couldn't dual boot well (windows/ubuntu on my thinkpad)... No yea, I am definitely neckbearding here, my argument basically boils down to "but it's not Linux wah!"
And specifically about the Mac hardware - I agree MacBooks are the best available, especially the touchpads. But Linux doesn't really support my 2016 MacBook Pro, so I have to use the XPS to run Linux.
I have a crazy powerful desktop, better than any mac hardware I could buy, so that I can run all the different things I want in a VM. I can kind of run a MacOS vm, but the performance is garbage. I just want to be able to run all the operating systems on a single machine, so I can not be limited. Is that too much to ask?
I've used and still used linux a lot but it can be a pain. Much of the desktop linux software is lacking that extra 10% of polish, there are always little annoyances. And nothing pains me more than needing to load up a QT app in my Gnome environment.
I tried switching to Linux, but so many parts of my workflow I was making compromises on. (for instance, I prefer Tower for git and Transmit for S3) Multi-monitor was a headache.
Compared to this Linux isn't all that bad. Took me a bit to find the magic xrandr invocation that would allow me to manage screen pseudo-brightness sanely. If I can find out the right way to put together a f.lux-style Night Mode I may switch to Linux on all machines.
Not with the latest round of laptops it isn't. One spec of dust and it's toast. But, yes it used to be and on older MBPros it's amazing. I've abused the hell out of mine and it's still going, minus a couple screwholes in the base no longer holding and some dents. Given the abuse, that's amazing.
To you. To others (like me) the biggest appeal was the only even vaguely usable & consistent OS, supported by nice hardware. Now they have replaced the nice hardware with thin-and-light toys with fake keyboards, we're in a bind.
> It seems to me that a Hackintosh is the worst of both worlds. If you spend that much time hacking around the hardware anyways, why not use Linux ?
Quite, I agree. I don't want to futz with either hardware or software, so have gone for a Windows laptop. Windows is profoundly horrible, but it does work for me without having to mess around. We really have reached the point in 2018 where there literally are no good options. Just least-worst for the task at hand.
Seems like the author depended on MacOS for their workflow?
If you need desktop power, anything Apple sells right now is out. iMac Pro included, because of lack of storage (for my particular needs at least).
I obviously don't know your particularly needs, and gather there's something I'm missing here — are there e.g. throughput issues with external SSDs? — so I'm curious to learn why my assumption is wrong!
Fast forward to present day, I have both a personal and a work macbook. I badly miss my Linux setup, but there aren't any other laptops that can compete with a MBP. I've debated installing Linux on my MBP, but then I'd be back to forcing an operating system to work on unsupported hardware.
I wouldn't say that MBP is "unsupported hardware" for Ubuntu.
I rebooted to OS X only rarely, for testing Mac programs, or sometimes for Skype and doing presentations, when I really didn't want to fuss with projector problems. (These days Skype is working a lot better on Linux..)
While unproven, it seems related to the T2 chip and it causes kernel panics in certain cases. There is a lengthy thread on the apple support community about this[1], and Ive worked with an apple engineer off and on for a few weeks to gather information about my system.
The symptoms are a kernel panic occurs when the system is allowed to sleep overnight with certain OS options enabled. The panic also occurs when the TB bus is loaded down or daisy chained and accessed by an application. So far there is no fix but ways to decrease the kernel panics.
The affected users appears to be anyone with an iMac Pro or 2018 macbook pro. I happen to have both of the affected products, but fortunately my macbook pro is not having this issue. In my case, I was able to turn off things like powernap, unlock with apple watch, and some other energy saving functions, but I dont want that to be a permanent configuration. I still get crashes when using applications that access the TB bus as well.
I also have a pair of rMBPs.
I dual boot with Windows 10 so I can game when I want to.
It's all about getting a very compatible motherboard. If you don't do your research, it's going to be a battle.
100% agree.
When buying, if one keeps to the specific hardware listed in the buyers guide and golden builds from tonymacx86, that alone should alleviate the majority of issues one could run into when building a hackintosh.
I did it about 8 or so years ago on a Thinkpad T60. It was fine, and basically worked.
But my time was more valuable than the incremental cost for Apple hardware.
What do you mean? A few examples would be helpful. I am not a frequent Windows user but my impressions, mostly confirmed by seeing other people comment online, is that Windows 7 was the "zenith of Windows UX", with a major step back due to "tabletization" with Windows 8 and partial return to glory with Windows 10.
The fact that some apps are designed for touch and look ridiculous on a desktop (calculator), others exist in two forms (the control panel) only makes Windows 10 more confusing, not less.
The things I miss the most about macOS on my Dell XPS 15 9570 are certain Mac-exclusive software products such as Apple Keynote, OmniOutliner, and OmniGraffle. But I still have my Mac Pro and my iPad for these apps.
More broadly, I think that OSX has been moving backwards while Windows has been moving forwards. It's purely subjective, but I think that OSX has an increasing number of nasty and persistent bugs. Windows is an inherently more complex platform, but Microsoft just seem to care more about software quality and the developer experience. VS Code is emblematic of what's happening within Microsoft - it's the best new text editor in recent years, it's freely licensed in full and the dev team are highly responsive to feedback and bug reports.
Windows is still occasionally quite annoying and has gained a few new annoyances with the move towards touch, but the proportion of stuff that Just Works seems to improve with every major update. My current dev machine has been running Windows 10 since launch without a reinstall or a BSOD. I'd probably be running Ubuntu if I didn't need a few key pieces of proprietary software, but using Windows really isn't much of a hardship. I loathed XP and 7, but I cheerfully tolerate Windows 10. It's not my dream OS, but it has never ruined my day.
The operating system came out 9 years ago. Windows 8 was a massive misstep but they've righted the ship somewhat with 10.
There's two control panels bit in each update more functionality moves into the Windows 10 style control panel.
The calculator is just a flat styled application not sure why it's rediculus. But tbh I use Google, Excel or Wolfram to do my calculations rather than that app.
Features that Windows 10 has for usability. Well there's multiple desktops, small things like built in f.lux.
It's nice that you can set a device specific pin for your account. Though having a cloud based account like Android or iPhone may upset some.
Also there's excellent touch screen support as a lot of laptops these days support it. Unloke OSX. Sometimes it's just better to scroll using your hands.
There's a lot of things under the hood that make it faster and more secure.
There are downsides like Random reboots for updates.
"[Steve Jobs] decreed that the Macintosh would remain perpetually bereft of slots, enclosed in a tightly sealed case, with only the limited expandability of the two serial ports."
https://www.folklore.org/StoryView.py?project=Macintosh&stor...
https://www.folklore.org/StoryView.py?project=Macintosh&stor... is the proper URL (for those like me who are curious, and want to see what you're talking about!)
A 2010 or newer Mac Pro would allow you to run the latest macOS version.
For mobile, where you do want decent battery life and power management I still use Apple's machines.
Many people here are UN*X ppl and that's great. But for people doing creative work such as Video, Audio, Graphics there are only 2 platforms - macOS / Windows.
I hope and believe Linux will catch up... there are already some products available in Linux flavor. But until then and when Apple's in-house ARM will be old enough to ditch Intel machines...
That's one of the most valid choices.
It's also possible to pass through a graphics card.
https://web.archive.org/web/20180807171806/https://martinher...
Everything from getting drivers to work, to handling updates, is a major pain. The whole point of the mac is that just works, and a Hackintosh is the furthest possible thing from that.
I'm not the Mac Pro customer (just programming) to begin with and I am satisfied with the 2015 and 2018 MacBook Pro's. Just as I don't even have a car let alone need a Lamborghini for groceries.
But it would be nice for once just to step on the pedal of one and hear it roar. If you know what I mean BIG GRIN
I don't think the Mac Pro will ever have USB-A again but surprise me.
Also, I've always been curious what the process for upgrading to new OS versions on a Hackintosh is like. Is it expected that once you get the machine in a working state, you are better off not to touch it?
Note: I need High Sierra because I use this particular machine for music production, and the latest Logic Pro X requires High Sierra, and all of my collaborators have updated so I can't open tracks originated by them anymore.
At the cost you've stated, your Ubuntu machine will fly, even compared to the Mac. Most often, even at half the cost, you'll end up with most use cases covered on Ubuntu
1. Apple desktop hardware 2. Windows OS software 3. Linux OS software
Laptops are another matter, I buy actual Apple hardware. But then I don't want a super powerful laptop, I have a desktop hackintosh for that ;)
It probably takes less money and effort to simply buy a Linux laptop.
I would't be. It doesn't matter if they build the dream "pro" machine today if they are not going to refresh the line for 10 years.
Or maybe I’ll run an OS that lets me say “no”