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Flip Flopping between macOS and Windows
- Thread starter LiE_
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Looks very promising. I have the same mobo, CPU, and PSU in my current micro-ATX gaming build. I also have the 32" version of the Dell monitor (S3220DGF, 1440p QHD, 165 Hz).
Two important things I like about the MAG B550M Mortar are A.) the ability to choose which temperature sensor a given fan header uses, and B.) that there are five fan headers.
This is particularly important to me since I modded my graphics card (Nvidia GeForce RTX 2070 SUPER + NZXT Kraken G12 bracket + EVGA CLC AIO 240mm cooler) and now use the MOS temperature to tell the graphics card AIO CLC cooler fans how fast to spin. I use a separate fan header (also based on the MOS temp) to tell the GPU VRM fan how fast to spin.
Also, the MSI mobo seems to be relatively responsive to BIOS changes. I manually bumped up the TDP power limits since I know my cooling solutions can handle a bigger bump. I'm not overclocking, I'm just letting the CPU run free without bumping into a thermal throttling scenario.
I am eyeing the MSI's MPG B550I Gaming Edge mini-ITX board for a different build.
The big AMD advantage right now is performance-per-watt.
Intel stayed competitive in processor benchmarks by throwing power efficiency out the window. Being stuck on the 14nm node, they had to. Semiconductor pundits say that TSMC's 7nm process node is roughly equivalent with Intel's 10nm process node, but the latter isn't pumping out parts to the general market yet.
As Apple transitions to Apple Silicon hardware, Hackintoshing approaches a dead end.
This will be initially noticeable with the graphics subsystem. What happens if Apple never supports AMD Radeon RX 6000 series cards? Or only a couple variants?
Heck, even with the RX 5000 and RX 500 series graphics cards, Apple provided support for a handful of models and some of the support isn't even very good. Perhaps Apple support of the venerable RX 580 is the best right now.
OpenGL support: gone.
32-bit application support: gone.
Resizable-BAR support? Unlikely.
DirectStorage support? Unlikely.
Ray-traced gaming? Unlikely.
Machine-based super-sampling (a la Nvidia DLSS)? Unlikely.
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That too. I'm somewhat forgiving of that as my office is in an unheated basement so I don't mind an extra space heater right now.
There are 5800X chips at a MicroCenter 50 miles away but my understanding of the state travel regulations right now means that I can't drive there and buy one without getting a COVID test. They don't have curbside as well nor delivery.
The price is MSRP as well. What would be perfect is an M1X iMac this March. We'd have benchmark leaks by now, though, if that were the case.
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I've made some changes to the build as one of the orders I made that included the case, RAM and storage hadn't shipped. This was due to the case going on back order. So I've cancelled that order and made some nice tweaks (in bold)
Motherboard: MSI MAG B550M MORTAR
CPU: AMD 5600X
GPU: Gigabyte GeForce RTX 3070 8GB AORUS MASTER
Monitor: Dell S2721DGFA
Case: Phanteks Eclipse P360 Air Mid Tower Case Tempered Glass DRGB- Glacier White
PSU: 650W Seasonic Core Gold
Memory: Corsair Vengeance LPX Black 32GB (2x16GB) 3600 MHz AMD Ryzen Tuned DDR4 Memory Dual Kit
Storage: WD Blue SN550 1TB NVME M.2 2280 PCIe Gen3 SSD
CPU Cooler: Noctua NH-D15 Chromax.black
Monitor should be arriving today, along with the keyboard and PSU extension cables.
The case change moves the build in a different and interesting direction. The exterior is white and the interior is black. So still going with all black interior, but the case does come with some RGB fans. The white exterior will match nicely with the white peripherals I have planned.
I have pretty much the same experience. I love macOS. I play games on my PS4 Pro but I have to have a Windows machine because I love playing old games too. Windows to me is very ugly and annoying. In the end it gets the job done, but there’s no joy to it, if you know what I mean.
I wouldn't call it ugly, it's very utilitarian. When you are in Chrome for example, the only real presence of Windows is the task bar and that's hardly ugly, I actually find it better than macOS.
There isn't anything I find annoying about Windows.
The most annoying thing about Windows to me is multi-monitor Virtual Desktop handling.
I don't have any experience with virtual desktops in Windows, I'm sure there are some more edge cases that are annoying but in general I can't think of anything that's annoying.
On macOS, the desktop is tied to the monitor. So Spaces with monitors are independent. So you can have two monitors and you change the desktop per monitor. A common way of working is where you have one monitor static with the other monitor where you have multiple desktops and just flip through them with the keyboard.
On Windows, all of the monitors are the desktop. So, when you change to another virtual desktop, all the monitors change. There are a ton of support requests asking that this behavior look like the macOS behavior or at least a switch to make it an option. I have built a trading workstation that connects to 3x4k but I have to leave them all static because I need two of my displays as they have a ton of financial information. I would like to use one of them with virtual desktop but I can't with Windows. At the moment, what I do is run a fourth monitor off of an old MacBook Pro with Spaces. But all of this takes up a lot of space on my desk. Three monitors would be enough if one of them could run Spaces.
It is very utilitarian. That's what makes it ugly. There's nothing artistic about it and serves only "get the job done" task. And there's so much space wasted on the screen. My PC is not and never will be touch capable so I don't know why few pictures and text should take 1/3 of my screen space. Not to mention that if you don't use Windows Store apps, lots of your apps can't work with proper scalling on HiDPI monitors. As a result you get blurry apps. It's amazing how lazy Microsoft is and don't bother to update so much things in there that stays the same for decades. I'm glad you like the taskbar but not only it's ugly but it doesn't show for example notification badges like the dock in macOS does.
The most annoying part of Windows is probably it's notification system and updates. I don't get why I have to be told my apps were updated if I just updated them by myself in the app. I don't get why some apps have to tell me that they're up and running after the OS boots up, etc.. You can say that I can disable the notifications I don't care about, but if I do that I won't be told anything at all. There's no toggle for turning off only the nagging ones. Also, why I have to install updates if I want to restart or shut down my computer? I don't even know what those updates do. There's no description and it used to be there in previous Windows. What the hell is this about?
Its funny you say that, because my experience is the polar opposite with macOS. For instance, I use Gotomypc (to connect to a work computer), and on windows its so much more efficient screen wise. On macOS, there's ugly ribbon that consumes too much off of the screen and leaves less room for the remote computer. Yes, that's probably an app issue, but the point is my experience is using macOS provides less efficient screen usage
Excel is another example, because of how fonts are rendered, they're just too small for me, and using excel on the Mac I frequently had to zoom the spreadsheet to 150 or even 200 to make it workable, where as on windows, 100% magnification is fine. The delivered macOS mail program has this small font issue as well, and perhaps its because of poor eyesight but its definitely something I find it better on windows
Windows is far from perfect, especially on the update side of things, but I truly hate how macOS nags you every day to update your system. There are reasons why I preferred not upgrading macOS but every day I see the notification in the upper right hand corner nagging me. I believe there used to be a terminal command to disable that, but Apple in its infinite wisdom disabled that a while back
it’s approaching a dead end
but if you want to buy a new machine right now that is upgradable and can boot both macos and windows (let alone many other operating systems) it beats buying a “new” intel mac
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Windows does use a lot of space.
But I'm afraid MacOS is going the same route. Just check out how much space Safari titlebar takes on Catalina compared to Big Sur.
And it's not just Safari, but other Apple apps as well.
I guess Apple is going to release touch screen devices that run MacOS in the near future. No other way of explaining that silly design choice.
But I'm afraid MacOS is going the same route. Just check out how much space Safari titlebar takes on Catalina compared to Big Sur.
And it's not just Safari, but other Apple apps as well.
I guess Apple is going to release touch screen devices that run MacOS in the near future. No other way of explaining that silly design choice.
every 500 and 5000 series card works with macos with the exception of a couple problematic brands. and performance for both series improved greatly with big sur
We're in the annoy part where Intel is the high-end and Apple Silicon is the low end and really great stuff is coming this year. Don't know if it's March or December. But what do you do if you need something right now? Either buy a cheap or used Mac or build a Hack or go Windows.
exactly. and building a hack gives you both macos and windows with better performance per dollar than a cheap or used mac
mind you sometimes i have to remind myself i got a free 4k 27” hand-me-down monitor from my wife’s office
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This is incorrect.
The Radeon RX 550 series (based on the Lexa architecture) is not supported in macOS. This I know because I own one of these cards (I purchased it for a Windows build). I also have a Sapphire Pulse Radeon RX 580 card that works great with macOS Mojave. I bought this GPU specifically for use with my Mac mini 2018.
It's worth pointing out that Sonnet Technologies has a pretty detailed list of graphics card compatibility (for both Mac and Win) based on each AIB's individual SKUs. They aren't going to lie and say that Mac support is there/not there because Mac users are their primary market for the eGFX Breakaway Box.
According to this chart, the Radeon RX 590 cards aren't supported by macOS either.
It's worth pointing out that trying to acquire a macOS-compatible graphics card is a laughable disaster right now with many of these older generation GPUs going for 2.5x to 3x their release price.
That ghetto RX 550 that doesn't even have power connectors because it draws all the power it needs from the PCIe slot? I paid $65 in August. Today's street price is somewhere in the $180-200 range. Four. Year. Old. Graphics. Card.
Building a Hackintosh right now is a not only a dead end, it's a stupidly expensive dead end. You might as well buy the Intel Mac. At least you'll receive support.
I too have a build with a case with a white exterior/black interior (NZXT H210) but I am going small. The Ryzen 5600X can easily be cooled by a 120mm AIO CLC.
The missing piece (due to the current abysmal state of GPU availability) is an RTX 3080 with a 240mm AIO CLC. There are suitable EVGA and Gigabyte products but zero availability. I will have to be patient.
That's good RAM, I have some in another case, not doing anything crazy with it.
I actually didn't realize there were 500 series cards that weren't Polaris. I should have stated that all navi 10 and polaris 10 and 20 cards work with macOS (with the exception of some problematic brands)
there are plenty of reports of rx 590 working with macOS
building a pc at all right now is insanely expensive, I'll give you that. I'm glad I did my current build when I did but confident I could still do it now for less than a comparable iMac, which I just specked out on apple.com at $4500 US
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Yeah, the card I bought last fall is a lot more expensive right now. I've found some cheap Dell Precision workstations locally ($150 - $300) which might be Hackable. And some of them have passable graphics. These were probably engineering systems that a company disposed of. These would be better than my current experimental system as they are several years newer. These are generally Xeons with a lot of cores.