Can anyone using macbook air A1466, please, tell me the version of GNU/Linux distribution it works fine with?
Thank you in advance!
Can anyone using macbook air A1466, please, tell me the version of GNU/Linux distribution it works fine with?
Thank you in advance!
Last edited by I_K; January 10th, 2013 at 05:36 PM.
I have no experience with running Linux on a MBA but I can tell you from other experience that it generally doesn't play as nice on over-engineered Apple hardware. That means systems like the MBA, iMacs etc. don't run it as well without a massive amount of configuration. Systems that heavily modify hardware standards to suit the case/enclosure design and put that before hardware function. Because of this it is heavily engineered to run Mac OS. The best way to run other OS is in a virtual machine. That will be a lot less of a headache for you.
For booting Linux as the main OS a Mac Mini or Mac Pro will generally make a good Linux system. Older PowerPC systems like G4 towers are perfect Linux machines. Everything always works out of the box. You can pick them up for $50 and under on Craigslist and Ebay.
Just my two cents.
PowerPC Liberation
Liberating the greatest computer architecture ever created.
powerpcliberation, thanks a lot for your post and suggestions!
I would like to try MBA though.
It's generally true that Apple's hardware starts getting cranky as soon as you try running non-Apple operating systems on it. However, I have been running Ubuntu 12.10 on my MacBookAir5,2 with minimal issues. It actually runs more smoothly for me than Windows 8, which I have not been able to get past the post-install stage.
The only issue I had with Ubuntu 12.10 was with wifi. Initially it uses the wl module, but that just goes away after the first update. A smarter geek would probably take the time and figure out how to fix that, but I just loaded the alternative "brcmsmac" module with `sudo modprobe brcmsmac` in Terminal. That got wifi back on, so I added brcmsmac to /etc/modules to ensure that it loaded on next reboot.
It works well for me as a development machine. I have not tested its gaming capabilities, because that usage is not a priority for me.
Have fun!
Last edited by webfiend; January 15th, 2013 at 01:54 PM. Reason: typo
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