Make A Mac On The Cheap

We’re not usually the type for PC case mods, but when we received the tip for the Macbook Mod of hiding a Macbook inside of two Linksys routers, we decided to make an exception on three accounts. [Tyler’s] original intent was acquiring a Mac, the total price for a full functioning system was a little over $200, and Macs aren’t PCs.

[Thanks Bluewraith]

But what if you want the mac experience and not the nitty gritty hassle of fixing logic boards, searching for long lost components, and modding a case? Then buy a Mac you might like [Useless Ninjas’] super cheap modification of an MSI Wind into Leopard running brute for only $240.

[Thanks Flyordie2]

25 thoughts on “Make A Mac On The Cheap

  1. For what it’s worth, if you run with the Wind approach, apparently Apple released a recent patch that kills support for the Intel Atom CPU.. I believe this only affects Snow Leopard OSX86 users, but as I don’t have any Atom CPUs around me, I can’t be certain – just keep that in mind..

    You may also consider getting a Pystar machine.. Go google that if you want a Mac machine, but with PC hardware and everything working out a neatly packaged box delivered to your nearest mailing address (and no, I’m not even remotely affiliated with Pystar, I guess do your homework on them, I just make my own boxes, so I’ve never bought one of theirs).

    Cheers

  2. Er, why, Jon? “Stupid” isn’t particularly descriptive. Or are you just trolling?

    As a multi-OS user, I thought both articles were pretty darn interesting.

    My only complaint is neither article mentions arduinos. ;)

  3. actually macs are personal computers… pcs… thats what that stands for…

    as a side note, i think its kinda funny how apple has, through advertising, effectively changed the terms meaning to exclude themselves from this label.

  4. Great mod! I’ve got an iMac with a smashed screen running in the garage. I got it for peanuts with the intention of using it as a webcam controller. I’ve been toying with rehousing it into something more stealthy for a while but have never got round to it. Maybe it’s about time!

  5. Why not just use Linux, eventually everyone will be, it is just a matter of time. Bill Gates knows Linux rocks, Steve Jobs knows Linux rocks. They are just biding their time and trying to take as much money as they can while they can.

  6. @eeun: Lol, I would really get flamed by the mac trolls then-your using an arduino with my holy mac, how dare you. The arduino is on the desk near the mod though if it is any consolation.

  7. I find it somehow ironic that the ford-chevyisms persist here even though you can make just about anything run on just about anything nowadays.

    Pointless childish bickering aside, I’d say the project is well done and gives the builder what they were looking for, so good on ’em! :D

    Just run what brings you joy and revel in that. :)

  8. At first I kind of just groaned at the idea they spent the time and money to build a headless laptop. Could have just went to buy a broken screen laptop and plugged a monitor into it. But the total did come out a little lower than expected.
    Their pages are a bit disorganized but I was just trying to find out if they had to trace the pin out for the peripherals… I don’t see any documented but I always wanted to know if I could put an iSight camera or other laptop cam on a usb cable to have a better camera on my laptop, and a well documented touchpad would also be nice to have. Imagine a decent multi-touch touchpad replacement

  9. Egads, that “blog” is hard to follow. I got a couple of 404’s and a the same page 2-3 times and couldn’t get anything else out of it. WTF is wrong with simple HTML for static content…

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