I couldn't quote that format properly, it only showed my initial questions and not your replies. Let's hope my copy and past job works out ok.
A. My preference is to run OSX on a separate drive. My additional preference is to keep the Hackintosh files on a USB boot stick, which contains the bootloader. This allows the OSX drive to remain 100% stock Mac (you can literally swap it into a real Mac if needed). This isn't the right option for everyone, but I like the "vanilla" aspect of having an untouched Mac drive. Also, the bootloader lets you select Windows or Mac (or other) at bootup, which is convenient for booting into say a Windows 10 drive.
One thing to consider would be getting a couple of $99 solid-state drives (250 gigs at that price), one for Windows & one for Mac, and then a data storage drive. You can install Paragon NTFS for Mac under OSX to read Windows drivers or MacDrive under Windows to read Mac drives. Here's a good solid-state drive:
I think part of the confusion here is probably my fault...I was typing late and I'm not the most concise person.
I'm not too worried about Windows at the moment. I'm on a Mac now and no longer dual boot. My question was about whether or not I can keep just OSX on a separate drive from the programs. I've heard it recommended to do that way so that you can easily do a fresh install of just the OS and not have to reload programs, etc...then I heard that the programs like to be actually with the OS on the same drive. I believe Windows was that way in the past at least.
I recall your past posts about keeping the "hack" files on a separate USB. I like the sound of going this route, but I wouldn't know how to accomplish that. I'm going to follow the Tonymac unibeast/clover guide and unless someone tells me how to add that step properly I won't know what to do.
A. Basically, you never know if an update is going to break something on a Hackintosh. For convenience, get a cheap backup drive and clone your main install to it, then run the update on your boot drive. That way, if your boot drive is unbootable after the update, you can just boot up to the backup drive & clone it back to the boot drive to recover your system. A 500-gig drive is under fifty bucks:
So it has to reside on it's own drive?...it couldn't be a clone just onto whatever I'm using for backups and data?
A. Gigabyte generally has the most compatible hardware for Hackintosh. The key idea of Hackintosh is getting OSX to run on PC parts; the catch is that everything still needs a driver. Gigabyte boards share a lot of hardware with Intel Macs, so drivers already exist for the shared parts, which makes installation a lot easier. If you're careful about choosing a board & add-on cards, you won't even have to install anything special to get it working. I'd imagine an October list is due any time now, but the September hardware compatibility list is still relevant:
http://www.tonymacx86.com/building-c...mber-2015.html
Typically, you want to get hardware that is one generation behind. That gives Apple a chance to release updated hardware, with updated drivers, which gives the last-generation hardware better support. The newer stuff that just came out typically needs hacks to get working, so it's more of a headache & sometimes less stable & can have fewer features due to lack of support.
Ok, just wasn't sure if that was still the case and not sure which parts your referring to as there are now a lot of cases where the audio and networking chipsets might actually be more compatible with a particular Asus board...its seems to vary from board to board. So maybe you're talking about other chipsets? Maybe there's something I can look out for?
I had heard it didn't matter nowadays because of unlocked MSR's...not sure I have that right or what it is.
Yeah, I was planning on going with Z97 and not doing Skylake even if OSX supports it by the time I'm ready to purchase...however, I think, but am not sure, that Z97 is not natively supported by OSX? I'm not sure any hardware came out with that chipset, but maybe it did, I know it was Z87 only for a long time and X99 is still not supported officially.
A. Basically, some of the mini boards come with a Mini-PCIe combo card that contains both Bluetooth & Wifi. However, there is no Wifi driver for the card, so only the Bluetooth part of the chip will function under Hackintosh. Since it is a mini board, it only has one full-sized PCIe port, which most people use for graphics cards (unless you're OK with using the onboard integrated graphics that come with the CPU). If you're not planning on an aftermarket GPU, then you can use a full-sized TP-Link PCIe Wifi card to get wireless working. So it's basically a workaround since the onboard Wifi isn't functional under Hackintosh, but then you can't put in a beefier GPU. That's the catch of having a mini board. There are also some USB Wifi adapters available, although they are not natively recognized & require the installation of a driver & SSID scanner program (for example, Edimax has a small USB Wifi adapter that I believe uses the Realtek driver for wireless hookup).
Now we're getting somewhere! This helps a lot. I had figured out part of it, but not all and also wasn't sure. Part of what made me doubt what I was thinking was that it still says "if you don't use the PCI-E card" bit for mATX and it's only ITX that has one slot....so still foggy there. Perhaps it's poor wording or a mistake on tonymac's site.
I get the basics now, but then comes the continuity and handoff part...if I want that I don't think I can use the onboard BT and the PCI-E full WiFi card for that? So it seems then it's back to taking out the mini card and then using something like they've rigged together in that link? I think some people even sell it with it all done for you and it would give me native BT/WiFi for basic use in addition to the continuity and handoff stuff?
Personally, I like to run things vanilla (stock) as much as possible. That means buying a very compatible motherboard, native video card, native wireless card or Ethernet card (if onboard Ethernet isn't natively supported), using a USB stick for the bootloader (in order to keep the hard drive 100% Mac-only), etc. That's not a requirement for everyone, but it certainly makes things easier in a number of ways. If you DO need to pop your drive in a Mac, you can, or vice-versa (like if your system craps out & you still need access to your drive). You also don't have to re-install the bootloader to the boot drive after doing a clone, since it's located separately on the USB stick. You don't have to set the order of the drives in the BIOS since you can set it to boot to the USB stick, and then choose your Windows or your Mac drive from there. I like the convenience of that setup.
Which drive is being referred to as "your drive"? The back up drive with the clone on it?
I want to do this the way you're describing for sure....especially the Vanilla and Native route.
If you don't mind a tiny bit of a larger system, check out the mATX boards like the Gigabyte GA-Z97M-D3H. That gives you some additional PCIe & PCI ports to work with. Oh, and I also use USB audio (Syba sticks are around $10 a pop & give nice clean audio natively), so I never have to mess with installing hardware drivers for the system itself. Might also be worth starting out with Mavericks, as El Capitan is pretty new & they are working through the update issues right now:
I am thinking or mATX and possibly ATX...I like the idea of a small case, but I'm more into the idea of a roomy, quiet case and a MB that has enough slots where I could add a GPU and a board that runs TB or whatever else may pop up down the road that I might need as I like to keep systems for a long time. Wanting to go for longevity is the only thing really making me thinking of waiting a bit to see how Skylake pans out.
Thanks for the tip on the USB stick that would work. I'll be using an audio interface for my audio, but I don't know if those work natively or what so that's good to know there's a cheap native option.
What about Yosemite...seems pretty good, no?
Thanks so much for all your help. You have no idea how grateful I am and how much this helps me sort through all this!
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