Hackintosh for Photographers and Videographers – Follow Up Part 3

Well, well, I’m running this little beauty for nearly two months now. So I can report back my findings so far.

Below are some improvements and tweaks to the Hackintosh/Ryzentosh build.

Mainboard BIOS Update

Originally I was hesitant to update  the BIOS in the event the Hackintosh wouldn’t boot anymore. Today I bit the bullet after a complete Time Machine backup and the original OpenCore USB key boot drive! Now  the success…

I’ve updated the BIOS version from 2203 to 2607 on the ASUS X570 TUF mainboard which seemed to improved my M.2 write speeds at least (but there’s more!)

SSD M.2 Speed Test

The BIOS update seemed to improved my M.2 write speeds from my ADATA XPG SX8200 Pro 512GB M.2. ADATA claim it has 3500MB/s / 3000MB/s read and write speeds. I achieve 2842MB/s / 2144 MB/s read and write.

Using Crystal Disk Mark (Windows Only) would probably show closer to the manufacturer’s specifications. Black Magic Design Test is just really an indicator you are in the right the direction. Which clearly I am.

Of course newer PCIe 4.0 type NVMe drives have much much more read throughput at 5000 MB/s but hey this isn’t bad at all. The results from Black Magic Design’s utility Disk Speed Test below…
download link

Keep in mind that PCIe 4.0 really only gives you more read speed than write speed. So the price premium right now isn’t worth the cost of upgrading just yet. Wait a few months though, this will probably change.

MacOS Update

After the BIOS update, I proceed to update MacOS. Not a trivial matter, considering the size and magnitude! A minor revision to Catalina 10.15.6. To my relief it all went swimmingly. Not a peek or a beep out it out. The machine handled everything as it should. Can breath once again!

Shutdown Issue Resolved

Whether the BIOS update or the MacOS update, the issue of shutdown restart each time, is now resolved. Shutdown now performs as it should. It switches off the machine and no more restarts. I conclude I am now a happy camper!

GUI Bootloader

I’ve installed Pop_OS on another drive. The text of the bootloader which comes with Opencore, works very nicely without any tweaking at all. It picked up the second OS automatically. Sweet!

After my installation I thought to my self there must be a GUI version of the bootloader to make things prettier. Sure enough there is an UI Bootloader.

From the poor screenshot above the Time Machine icon is green not sure why. But it’s not bad, for a first attempt – I reckon!

The guide to do this is here – https://dortania.github.io/OpenCore-Post-Install/cosmetic/gui.html

But wait there is more, custom icons to match my red and black hardware scheme. Oh baby I’m lovin’ it! (Other schemes are available too)

https://github.com/blackosx/OpenCanopyIconPacks/tree/master/BOCIP_3_Cardinal

USB Mapping

Yes, I know should have done this away away before. But all my USB ports work. Maybe not at the right speed 5Mbps instead of 10Mbps.

https://dortania.github.io/OpenCore-Post-Install/usb/#macos-and-the-15-port-limit

Opencore Update

Originally I installed 0.5.9 and now 0.6.0 is out. There is guide to assist in doing the update. 0.5.9 to 0.6.0

That’s it for the moment!

Leave a Reply