iPhone Development on Hackintosh

Question

My question is in regards to developing code for the iPhone / iTouch.

What with Apple\'s transition to the Intel platform for their chip, it is obviously now possibl

Answer 1

It's possible. But you are restricted to the choice of hardware for the hackintosh. Even if you get it right, no one can guarantee everything will work (sound, lan, etc.). If you can run the OS, you can run xcode with the SDK. But I don't think you'll be 100% satisfied with the end result.

As I see it if you want to run os x it's better to invest in a mac mini than in hardware for a hackintosh. Asuming you'll be buying all the components for the hackintosh.

Answer 2

Current version of Visual Studio (2019) and Xamarin Forms will enable to develop IPhone apps by utilizing Xamarin Hot-Restart (Preview) feature without requiring a Mac.

In my case, I have an IPhone and would like to develop an IPhone app however I was being forced (until this day) to buy a Mac (or at least chosing the Hackintosh way) develop an IPhone App. Now I can write and debug my app directly on my IPhone (which is fair!).

Details here: https://nicksnettravels.builttoroam.com/ios-dev-no-mac

Answer 3

On a $10 P4 2.4GHz, 1GB RAM, hackintosh works fine and xcode/iphone sdk works as well. Its a little slow, but stable, and a very viable option for someone looking to just test the water of iphone development, without committing the cash.

Answer 4

Hackintoshes are a great value. You can spend anywhere from $400 to $4000 and get an extremely capable machine.

You want to go with a Gigabyte brand Z87 motherboard, Intel Core i CPUs, Nvidia graphics, and SSDs. Avoid budget hardware, it usually isn't compatible. Or you could go the Intel NUC route and get a NUC, a small PCIe SSD (32GB or 64GB should do the trick), and some laptop ram.

Do your research and you're good.

Answer 5

You can do it, I started learning iPhone/Objective-C/Cocoa development using a virtual machine and an image of OSX (it was a pain to setup though and I think I could only use OSX 10.5.2)

It's just not worth the hassle, in the end I just stumped up £365 or so for a second-hand 2007 model MacBook off eBay and it's been smooth sailing ever since.

Answer 6

Yes, you can. I have. But is it worth it?

If you are doing it for fun it's worth it.

If you are doing it for a real, useable Mac it's not worth it.

Now you will have a billion guys come down on me for saying that because some guys have built some truly impressive rigs but they are missing the point of a Mac. Macs just work well and are a pleasure to use while PC's just get stuff done and you probably secretly hate it.

I did it just for fun but I ended up spending more on a Hackintosh than I would have if I just bought a Mac Mini. Of course my computer is 4x as fast but it's just not the same as a real Mac. On Mac's everything just works... it's really nice. But on my Hackintosh nothing works without direct intervention on my part... not very nice.

I always planned on using that computer for windows development anyway so it wasn't a waste but otherwise it would have been a HUGE waste.