I'm looking for a secondary Mac desktop to host a file server, Time Machine backup, and maybe do some web browsing. Ideally I'd want to stack it with a couple large HD's for backup storage and an SSD for running apps.

I was originally thinking about building a Hackintosh but recently looked on eBay and found Mac Pros (2006 v1,1) running for around $200.

My plan is to find one and do some upgrades:

  • replace dual dual-core xeons with dual quad-core xeon X5365's (+$100)
  • upgrade RAM to ~16GB (+$0-50 depending on the Mac Pro)
  • add SSD and 2x4TB HD's (already have)

My question is would I be able to build a comparable hackintosh for around $350? I've found that the geekbench score for these Mac Pro 1,1's is around 11k but what I'm struggling with is determining if this old high performance hardware is better/worse than something like a core i3 or core i5 budget setup. Thoughts?

The disadvantages of going with a MacPro1,1 that I can think of:

  • 10 year old hardware - chance of failure
  • SATA is 3GB/s
  • Hardware RAID requires expensive rare old card with expensive rare batteries (I won't be electing for RAID)
  • CPU/RAM/bus speeds are from 10 year old hardware
submitted by NewC303
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