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Build Your Own Mac With CoreCrib Kit

Posted by pudge on from the i-want-a-laptop-version dept.

Mark Dobie writes "I just put up a quick review of the CoreCrib kit I purchased. It is an inexpensive solution to building your own Mac." See our previous Core coverage.

9 of 358 comments (clear)

  1. Please explain... by gricholson75 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    the popularity of these systems. I can get a emac 800Mgz/256MB/40GB for $849, and it comes with a monitor and better graphics, and the operating system. If I was going to build a linux system, you get better bang for the buck from x86 hardware. I don't understand. FP?

    1. Re:Please explain... by eXtro · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Don't compare these to an eMac, compare them to a G4 tower. For $849 you get a tower including PCI slots and and AGP port. If you're looking for a Macintosh that you can throw a couple of PCI cards (maybe a couple of SCSI adapters, whatever) but can't justify the price of a new Apple G4 system then maybe this is for you. For instance a dual 1.25 GHz Apple G4 tower costs $1999 with 256 MB RAM and an 80 GB hard drive. The site just stopped responding so I can't determine the price but presumably a dual 1.2 GHz their would be less than 2 grand.

      --

      Chris Kuivenhoven is a thief, beware

    2. Re:Please explain... by ilsie · · Score: 5, Insightful

      You don't go out and buy an eMac, or buy a tower, but you put exactly what you want in it. It's something that PC users have been doing for years

      Yes, but in contrast, the typical custom PC is built to accomplish three goals as opposed to buying a prebuilt desktop:

      1. Look better
      2. Higher performance
      3. Cheaper

      These mac clone kits accomplish none of these things.

  2. DIY Mac.. by grub · · Score: 5, Insightful


    A Do It Yourself Mac seems tantamount to a Do It Yourself Mercedes..

    These will be popular among the geeks, but the Mac masses will stick to boxes from Cupertino.

    --
    Trolling is a art,
  3. Hmmm. by Phroggy · · Score: 5, Insightful

    So, it's a G4/800 tower, for $775 plus extra hardware (hard drive, etc.) plus software (Mac OS X, applications). In contrast, the eMac is a G4/800 for $799 and includes a 17" monitor, 40GB hard drive, CD-ROM, Mac OS X, and a handful of software (AppleWorks, Quicken, World Book Encyclopedia, etc.). Oh, and a full 1-yr warranty from Apple.

    Of course, the eMac isn't expandable (you can upgrade the RAM and add an AirPort card; everything else has to be external, and you can't run a split desktop on dual monitors). Still, compare to eBay...

    --
    $x='S24;r)>63/* h@<5+oZ)32"5cz';$me='phroggy'x$];
    $x=~y+ -xz+\0-Tx+;print$_^chop$me for split'',$x;
  4. In other news.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    You can build your own Ford by ordering all the parts from Ford and assembling them yourself.

  5. Re:Mirror by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    1) upload slashdotted .com website with megatonage of images to own homepage account on university webserver
    2) watch own homepage account thence university webserver slashdotted to death by largest geek website in the world in 1 minute flat
    3) see smoke coming out of cheap server PSU and hear teenage girls using IE on campus saying "who turned off the internet I need to google for my term paper"
    4) hope university is more charitable towards having lart student homepage account burn 1000s$ of bandwidth & take down university network than towards P2P file-sharing bandwidth $$$
    5) have 56k modem on hand when dean demands network card confiscated
    6) ????

  6. Re:Waiting for PPC 970 by afidel · · Score: 5, Informative

    The PPC970 is not a pure RISC chip, if it were the decode stage would be unnecessary. There are a number of instructions that break down into two or more internal operations that the execution units have to deal with. From the IBM POWER whitepaper "Cracked instructions flow into groups as any other instructions with one restriction. Both IOPs must be in the same group. If both IOPs cannot fit into the current group, the group is terminated and a new group is initiated. The instruction following the cracked instruction may be in the same group as the cracked instruction, assuming there is room in the group. Millicoded instructions always start a new group. The instruction following the millicoded instruction also initiates a new group." This is much closer to CISC->RISC translation that happens in all modern x86 cpu's then it is to a traditional RISC design.

    --
    There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.
  7. Apple sells refurbished Macs by Andrew+Lockhart · · Score: 5, Informative

    It's silly to compare these kits to a brand new Mac when Apple themselves sell refurbished products.Keep in mind that the refurb'ed PowerMacs already come with ram, an hd, graphics, a superdrive, an os, etc. Oh yeah, they also have a one year warranty from Apple and are still eligible for their AppleCare Protection Plan. Two things that I doubt these kits have.