This will be a two part post. On the first part I will try to explain the what and why of a Hackintosh. In the second part I will relay my recent horror experience with my own computer.
I bought my first Apple computer, an indigo iMac, in 2001. The saying 'once you go Mac you never go back' was true for me. About ten years and three macs later, I needed a new computer. An actual Mac was too expensive for me at that time, so I decided to try and make a Hackintosh.
A Hackintosh is a regular PC running Mac OS X. Of course, Mac OS X runs only on Apple computers. In order to make it run on a PC two things are needed. The first is specific hardware, so that they can be recognised by the operating system. The second is to install additional programs that fool Mac OS into thinking that it's running on a Mac; hence the name Hackintosh. Thankfully, there is a big community of users that have made the whole process as straightforward as possible. They also assist on solving problems that may arise during and after the build.
Apple computers are expensive. They are not more expensive though than the sum of their parts. Trying to build a PC with the exact same components will cost about the same as a Mac. But there is always the option to sacrifice a bit of the performance in order to save on costs. You will still have a fairly powerful machine without paying premium and it will behave as a normal Macintosh.
Another factor for me was the challenge of this endeavour. Yes, the process is straightforward enough but I had to begin at zero. I had to learn everything about computer hardware, the inner workings of a PC and a Mac and how to make everything work.
No. Mac OS X is designed for Apple computers only. Apple has taken legal action in the past against a company that was selling ready Hackintosh computers. Yet, all the sites that provide instructions and the software tools on how to make a Hackintosh seem to be unaffected. The same goes for the users of said machines. Although Apple must be aware of how many regular PCs run Mac OS X, they decide to leave them be.
Besides, only a few crazy ones will try to make the impossible happen. Once Apple was reaching out to those crazy ones...
