Ask HN: What is your experience installing/using Linux on a Mac machine? - hackerm0nkey
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ksherlock
I tried using mklinux on a PPC (a Performa, maybe?). I don't think X worked at
the time, so it was strictly text mode. "Text mode" I should say: there was no
80x24 text mode so it was eg, a 640x480 bitmap using pixels to render the
characters to draw the console. Which looks nicer and is more flexible but
much slower.

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simonblack
I once tried Linux on an old G4 MacBook (Power Chip - before the Intel chips).

It was just as slow using Linux as it was using 'Tiger', and also some
peripherals weren't supported.

For what it's worth, Linus used to use a MacBook with Linux. But that was
several years ago. I don't know what he uses now.

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yellow_lead
I used rEFInd to install it on my Mid 2015 MacBook pro last year. It works
great. I heard theres some custom configuration needed for the touchbar in the
newer ones though.

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em-bee
what are your concerns?

linux runs fine on a mac. given the limited selection of hardware variations,
it is less likely to run into surprises. as far as i could tell all
peripherals on my mac are working. the boot manager refind also works well.

the only thing you need to do after installation is to configure the touchpad
to support 3 mouse buttons. once that's done, linux on a mac is a great
experience.

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codemusings
That is absolutely not true. Current Macbook Pros since 2016 have a whole
variety of issues that are dealbreakers for day to day use. There's even a
Github repo with checklists and kernel patches.

iMac Generations have been hit or miss depending on the AMD GPU that was
included. I also think it'll get only harder from here on out with the T2
chips etc.

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stevekemp
Agreed. I was given a macbook last year for working upon. At the time I
couldn't install Debian because the provided kernel didn't recognize the
onboard disk-driver.

Installed Ubuntu, which recognized the drive, but which didn't give me working
WiFi. It would detect the NIC, present a list of networks, but then drop after
1-3 seconds.

It was only recently that I upgraded to a newer kernel and found that I could
use the on-board wifi. (Until then I'd been using a USB-based WiFi dongle.)

I don't use touch-pad, bluetooth, etc. But just the basics "install + have
wifi" were non-trivial.

Of course it might be easier now as the latest stable releases have new enough
kernels that things will work more easily, but I fought and I wish I'd been
able to use a generic intel-laptop.

