Musings on a new computer - advice PLZ & THX

[Grey Fox]

You love OS X THAT much?

[Barrister]

You love OS X THAT much?

That's what I'm trying to get a handle on - how much work is going hackintosh, so I can figure out if I like OS X enough to do it.

It really is very, very good.  And besides I'm deep in the Apple ecosystem at this point - iPhone, lots of iTunes content, Apple TV, wife's MacBook Pro, kids iPad, Apple AirPort...

[Grey Fox]

Ah.

After a quick google seach if I was doing this I would go on kakewalk.se & buy what he recommends & use his tools.

[Barrister]

Ah.

After a quick google seach if I was doing this I would go on kakewalk.se & buy what he recommends & use his tools.

The #1 go-to site seems to be http://www.tonymacx86.com

I checked out your site but seems to have no updates for the last year.

[Grey Fox]

That does seem to be a better site.


Have you considered Macbuntu?

or just use this transformation pack to make Windows look like mac OS.

[DontSayBanana]

I haven't done a Hackintosh, but I'm strongly considering setting one up myself, since I'd really like to be able to use XCode for iOS app development.

[OttoVonBismarck]

You know what I would do?

I'd do a 27" iMac. The $1800 base model (going USD here chief), has the discrete graphics card (but you obviously know it's a mobile card, but unless you're going for bleeding edge it's fine), and comes standard with a 1 TB drive. If you're into SSD you can actually roll with a 256 gb SSD and do two partitions and put your OSes on both. With the speeds of USB 3.0 or Thunderbolt buy a 1 TB external drive and there's really no reason to put anything else on your OS SSD if you're concerned for space. But if you're fine with a slower HDD (I am, personally), the $1800 base model with 1 TB standard is more than you'd ever need.

It just seems like the best option for what you're wanting. While things are better than ever before, it's still I think required to have a bootable Windows install to absolutely maximize the number of games you can easily play without virtualizing (which causes a performance hit.) So you really need something that can boot into Windows, and you want to keep OSX. Best way to do that right now, with your price parameters are an iMac.

Further, the 27" iMac display is very, very nice. You can also set it to turn into a monitor (I forget the name of the mode) and hook a laptop to it. So maybe if your wife ever needs / wants to work on a big screen or dual screens she could actually use the iMac for that. It's essentially the $999 27" Thunderbolt display sold by Apple separately, but for $900 more you get a Mac inside of it. I think they're a strong value.

The most compelling thing about MBP is its portability. But I didn't read anything in your posts where that portability seemed to matter much to you, and in that case I can't see a better option than the iMac for you.

[OttoVonBismarck]

I'd never buy it but depending on the games, the Intel IRIS GPU in the $2000 MBP may be fine for your gaming needs. My understanding is it actually beats the prior gen MBPs in performance, while obviously not being equivalent to a discrete GPU in a current generation laptop. But it is a big price step-up from $2k to $2.7k to get the discrete GPU in the MBP.

[Beenherebefore]

If you are going for laptops, I would most likely buy a Mac.
It kinda just works.

If you're going for a Win laptop, I would check out the more pricey sections of MSI, Asus and Dell's offerings.

Why anyone would not want a Windows desktop gaming computer is beyond me.

Built my third in four years. This is my 40 year crisis motorcycle.