@dtr Hi, I have a 2600k CPU, Gigabyte Z68X-UD3R-B3 motherboard, 16GB of Corsair CMZ8GX3M2A1600C9 memory, but I am new to overclocking, could you recommend some quick settings for me to play with?

Thanks.

@dtr

Thanks for your kind help! I will try to play with it.

So, I've pulled the trigger on all the parts to build my Hackintosh. I'm pretty excited as I've been waiting about a year for all the parts I wanted to become available. For my setup, I absolutely needed a system that was both cost effective and upgradeable. Now, I just hope it works and will be stable. :-D

I'm going to start out with the stock CPU cooler. I'll see how the heat and noise fare. But just wondering what you all would recommend for a better cooler? Here are the parts I'm looking at (it's all based on the Customac Pro).

Intel Core i7-3770K Quad-Core Processor 3.5 GHz Gigabyte Intel Z77 Dual Thunderbolt ATX Motherboard with BT4.0/Wi-Fi (GA-Z77X-UP5-TH) Corsair Professional Series 650-Watt SanDisk Extreme SSD 480 GB EVGA GeForce GTX680 Corsair Vengeance 16 GB (2x8GB) Corsair Carbide Series 500R Mid Tower Gaming Case

I'll also be moving my Kona 3 and RocketRaid 2322 cards over from an old Mac Pro tower. Folks over on Tonymac say that those cards should work fine once I get everything installed. In order to get Davinci Resolve working with broadcast monitoring, I'm thinking about a Blackmagic Ultrastudio to replace the Kona 3 - but the cheaper Ultrastudio model keeps getting pushed back. BMD drives me crazy with it's vaporhardware - one reason I've always stuck with AJA.

For those of you who had never build a computer in your life before, LIKE ME ;) and have very little idea of what it is to do it, from everything I looked up in the net so far, I found this tutorial video to be the best, detail, but not overwhelming,

part two is provably what you need to watch. If people has any suggestions that consider better, please post, thank you.

@xavieramelio I went with the Cooler Master Hyper 212 Plus. It's working great. Took down my CPU temp about 10-20 degrees. It stays around 36-40 now, whereas with the Intel heat sync it was going as high as 50 or 60! System is very quiet. The CoolerMaster requires a plate as well. Luckily the Corsair 500R allows you access to the back of the motherboard. It's a great case (but I have to RMA it unfortunately as the power button doesn't work).

@qwerty123 It went amazingly smooth considering the task at hand, but there were bumps. One very big and unfortunate bump.

First, my reason for purchasing. This is entirely for my business, which is post production. Apple isn't offering anything attractive right now. Mac Minis are too underpowered and I don't want an all-in-one unit that's not upgradeable. And putting a retina macbook pro in an edit suite is just unthinkable, no matter how much people like them. This has cost me around $2000 and I think it's well worth it (that said, I need to run some jobs on the system to prove it's cost-worthiness).

I need something stable (enough) and something that is cost effective. I owned the Kona 2 and RocketRaid card (thus my reason for not buying a blackmagic card - plus, I need SDI in and out). That said, I see this computer as a stop-gap. If, tomorrow, apple came out with a new Mac Pro, I would sell my old systems and finance the darned thing. There is something to be said about ease-of-use. And there is also something to be said about DIY and ownership. The hackintosh isn't easy, but it's also pretty straightforward if you follow the guides.

So far, the system is rock solid. No DSDT with this motherboard. It just works. Installation was a little scary as the first time it didn't stick, but a reboot solved it and OSX loaded fine from the USB stick. I followed these instructions and everything went so smooth: http://hacksbyalfa.com/post/28271035968/gigabytehackintosh

The great news: the Kona 3 works!!! I couldn't believe it. FCPX, Premiere and Avid all play video out perfectly. I haven't captured anything, but I suspect it would work just fine.

The absolutely horrible news: for some odd reason, the RocketRaid 2322 de-initializes any drive that is attached to it when the computer reboots. When the computer boots, it takes you to a BIOS screen for the 2322 card as it's trying to find drives. I think, somehow, it sees the Mac volume and initializes it as MS-DOS. This is absolutely 100% completely and utterly horrible. I tried everything, including updating the firmware on the card. I honestly don't think it has anything to do with the Hackintosh - it's a PC thing.

I've contacted Highpoint support and I truly hope that something gets worked out. But my feeling is that I'm just going to have to get a new card. I've posted questions on Tonymacx86 about this, including asking about any compatible eSATA cards as I need one for the system. I'll probably test out a RocketRaid 2711 card from Amazon or Newegg since it will be returnable. Such a bummer.

Beyond that, everything has been running amazingly smooth (knock on wood). I even installed Windows 8 on a separate drive and it runs fine.

I got a Syba Firewire card. It's just ok. There was a recommendation for this card: StarTech.com 3 Port 2b 1a 1394 PCI Express FireWire Card. I ordered it to test it out and will get it next week.

I downloaded the Resolve 9 Beta today. Will install tomorrow or Monday to see how it goes. Since I don't have a Blackmagic card, I can't fully test it out to my display. But I'll let you all know if it works (I think it will).

@artiswar awwwwesome. that's very close to what i got. let me know how the 660 works out. i got the 680, but wish i'd saved a few shekels. The cooler master is a great choice. At office, computer is on right now with no AC. It's just copying files over sata. CPU temp still averaging 37C and it's very quiet.

Cooler is a bit of a bitch to install if you haven't done it before. Instructions were confusing. Do a search for an install with it on youtube. Watch the one made by Cooler Master, first. It all makes perfect sense once you install it, but it's nerve wracking at first.

Which case are you getting? On mine, the corasair 500r, the power button doesn't work. Curious to know how it works for you.

@5thwall Let me know how the raid card hunt goes. I'm going nuts trying to find one that will even work well in windows, let alone the hackintosh side of my x79 sabertooth, 3820k setup.

First tried the RocketRaid 2314 - either bad card or simply not recognized by the motherboard. Returned (restocking fee).

Bought the RocketRaid 644, major issues - might have been a conflict with the marvell controller on the motherboard, even with the marvell controller disabled on the board i would get random BSOD's and sometimes the drivers would simply stop working after a reboot - finally gave up trying to fix it - a week after the 30day return period. The 644 is supposedly mac compatible, but I couldn't get working on the mac side either....

Purchased yet another RocketRaid (yeah stupid) 2642 - only to find that it isn't a port multiplier so my 8 bay esata box is useless with it.

Hightpoint tech support is not spectacular either....

Have a cheap silicon image card that came with the esata enclosure, but with raid 10, I only get 50 MB/s read and writes on it.

Keep me posted... I'll let you know if I find anything that works.

200mmx here, thinking about going with the pentium pro and throwing a extra stick of of ram in there get me up to 32mb

FCPX, FCP7, Davinci Resolve, Smoke 2013, and Avid Symphony all running at the same time. 32GB of RAM is AWESOME. Ever a real-world need to run these at the same time? Heck no! Just fun to see if it worked :D

@artiswar yes. here are all my specs: http://www.tonymacx86.com/buying-advice/64562-building-ivy-bridge-edit-color-grading-system-looking-some-advice.html

Is the reasoning why most aren't going for the 3930k is because of its age and secondly price compared to the 3770?

@artiswar thought about it, but I think the experience of building it and troubleshooting it was enough for me :D. If you do it, let me know your experience with it. Curious. Seems like it's not a straightforward thing.

@5thwall cool. I've heard about people not putting computers to sleep. What's your rationale for this? Also, why did you go with only a large ssd rather than a smaller ssd for the system drive and a large tb harddrive? I promise I'll stop asking questions soon! Ha.