A Mac Mini is $599 and comes with OS X ($129 by itself). The specs on the Mac Mini aren't awe-inspiring but they're perfectly usable. I just wouldn't be able to justify saving a few hundred bucks (max) by buying a bargain basement PC and running it as a Hackintosh. You lose all ability to get support from Apple, you have no guarantees it won't break compatibility in the future, and you are highly unlikely to get the same relatively seamless experience of a real Mac.
Bottom line, whatever money you save, you'll probably end up paying for/regretting later. I own both a Mac Mini and a Macbook and I've had a better experience with both than with any PC I've bought or built in the past. I just wouldn't recommend trying to make an end run around this for the sake of a few hundred bucks. Heck, if you add up VMWare ($189) and Leopard ($129) and the cost of even a bargain PC, you're pretty close to a Mac Mini already, so I can't see this being worth it.
