What I’m interested in, which may probably take years (or never happen well), is running Linux natively on these Macs after there’s no more macOS support from Apple. Typically Macs stop getting software support at around 7-9 years after first release. Hardware does tend to last longer and can serve some purposes beyond that.
Me too. Interestingly 2 MacBooks from the Intel era were amongst the best machines ever, objectively, for Linux.
The MacBook 2,1 is almost unique in being supported by Coreboot and Libreboot. Furthermore, because it had an Atheros wireless card, you didn't need any blobs at all. Only two old Thinkpads are comparable, among x86_64 machines.
The MacBook Air 11 Late 2012, which was used as a daily runner by Linus for a number of years, was a pure Intel machine. Except for a weak Broadcom card, it was flawless with a stock kernel. Plus, it was silent, small and fast. The only comparable machine in terms of silent operation, cost and Linux support was IMHO the Xiaomi Notebook 12.5, which was released quite recently.
The problem with ARM Macs is not just secure boot. The secure enclave chip already gave serious trouble when trying to run Linux on their last Intel machines, as e.g. the keyboard doesn't show up as a standard USB device. So I don't have high hopes.
Yeah, in particular the Mac mini has a lot of curb appeal as a 10+ year micro server. Considering it's plugged in and the fan should only spin up occasionally, it should last a long long time.
I'm pretty sure we'll have Linux running on it by then. Perhaps just CLI only.
>What I’m interested in, which may probably take years (or never happen well)
Probably wont take that long. Apple gives instructions to disable strict boot check and boot from any OS. The rest are the drivers. For graphics, they can start just using a framebuffer...
And 7-9 years is a fantastic support lifetime and yes, I know some folks who still use their 9 year old macbooks such as grandparents etc without major issue.
You have new android phones that ship with software 1.5 years old and NEVER get updated.
These M1 Macs are more like iPads than Intel Macs. Jail breaking them would be the first step, but after that one would need a ton of reverse engineering to write all the drivers for all the little custom HW built into M1 SoC.
I have never heard of an iPad running Linux (and iPads been around for a long time), so chances of M1 running Linux natively is slim.
I don't know why you believe it can never happen well, as linux already run in ARM processors for some time now.
Obviously it would take another canonical to do grunt driver creating work. But I suppose that if we don't see a quick response from intel or AMD, this hardware will take off and people will write the drivers.
Older macs could run Linux pretty well. I even had Gentoo running on an ancient PPC mac yonks ago. A few years back, I got Linux working (sorta) on a MacBook 14,3
With all the security on the newer Apple chips, I wonder if we'll ever see Linux boot on these things natively, much less get actual hardware driver support.
This is based off of Apple’s new Virtualization.framework introduced in Big Sur that lets you spin a Linux VM with half a dozen lines of code. The technology is still in its infancy (minimal emulated devices; not sure if there’s even a framebuffer) and I’d wait for something like Docker running on Hypervisor.framework (lower level APIs but more mature).
For Docker, virtualization framework is fine and provides everything we need. There is no framebuffer on hypervisor framework. There will be an arm qemu port for hypervisor framework fairly soon. I have Docker running on M1 with VF see https://twitter.com/justincormack/status/1331965304273047553
xhyve[0] doesn't look entirely production ready, but emulates a number of devices including networking, block storage, and a framebuffer while being based on Hypervisor.framework.
It's funny how the way to get a Linux on ARM machine with decent performance might be getting a Mac Mini and running Linux as a VM. I doubt nested virtualization will work though.
Even though this is a simple VM based on MacOS’s ARM virtualization framework, this combined with ssh and clever volume sharing is probably enough to make Docker on Mac work (but only with aarch64 Docker images) (export DOCKER_HOST=ssh://user@ip.) I’m excited to give it a shot when I get my Air next week.
I remember someone running a data center with bunch of Mac mini when Intel Mac mini came out to save space with its power efficiency but I guess it's another time someone might do it again when Linux can run natively flawlessly.
Nice, though that it was done quickly raises the question of why Apple hadn't tried harder to get some (even hacky) version of this together before the release.
Apple needed to get the platform to the market and what they've done so far is everything they needed to do. They haven't even updated the whole line yet, so just give it time and let them improve the basics first (no, virtualization isn't "the basics")
Apple going to ARM for the M1 is interesting, wonder how it might shift the server market... As a developer who might want to target both, wonder if any decent ARM VPSes?
Scaleway had ARM Dedis but quit offering that it seems. AWS has some but seems larger servers. Wonder if anything smaller for someone to tinker with without buying a new ARM MacBook. Maybe a Pi but was hoping more cloud stuff maybe to play with?
That always makes me wonder how much they have contributed to Linux itself? I know they funded CUPS for a while, which I guess is something, but has Apple ever upstreamed any useful kernel work code or device drivers or user space libraries or apps?
Virtualization is so dirty. I’ve never really come around to it. I’m waiting for the day when there’s a correction for how much we rely on it now and go back to a “pure” bare metal world.
This is industry revolution happening before your eyes.
Excluding smartphones/tablets, X86 has been the defacto computer architecture of personal computers. Microsoft tried an ARM processor but the tradeoffs were evident and it was considered half baked, leading to poor reviews.
For quite some time in our industry the main limitation has been clock speeds, nowadays the main limitation is temperature control.
Apple launched an ARM chipset that remains as cool as 50C when intel reaches 95C, this will forever change the industry of personal computing.
This is Hacker News. If getting Linux running for the first time on a completely new cpu/soc running just with the help of the barebones API from Apple isn't hacking, I don't know. When Parallels ships their ready-done product, it gets much less exciting, but for now it is pretty interesting.
It's the bread and butter of hacking new hardware to the point that it can boot Linux in some form. I think there's great prestige knowing that everything can boot Linux eventually as it means it has a shelf life after the company owning the proprietary solution has thrown it away.
Given how Apple treats iPads and iPhones, I wouldn't be surprised if these M1 Macs have a much shorter usability period than Intel Macs.
[+] [-] AnonC|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nextos|5 years ago|reply
The MacBook 2,1 is almost unique in being supported by Coreboot and Libreboot. Furthermore, because it had an Atheros wireless card, you didn't need any blobs at all. Only two old Thinkpads are comparable, among x86_64 machines.
The MacBook Air 11 Late 2012, which was used as a daily runner by Linus for a number of years, was a pure Intel machine. Except for a weak Broadcom card, it was flawless with a stock kernel. Plus, it was silent, small and fast. The only comparable machine in terms of silent operation, cost and Linux support was IMHO the Xiaomi Notebook 12.5, which was released quite recently.
The problem with ARM Macs is not just secure boot. The secure enclave chip already gave serious trouble when trying to run Linux on their last Intel machines, as e.g. the keyboard doesn't show up as a standard USB device. So I don't have high hopes.
[+] [-] ogre_codes|5 years ago|reply
I'm pretty sure we'll have Linux running on it by then. Perhaps just CLI only.
[+] [-] coldtea|5 years ago|reply
Probably wont take that long. Apple gives instructions to disable strict boot check and boot from any OS. The rest are the drivers. For graphics, they can start just using a framebuffer...
[+] [-] donor20|5 years ago|reply
You have new android phones that ship with software 1.5 years old and NEVER get updated.
[+] [-] sally1620|5 years ago|reply
I have never heard of an iPad running Linux (and iPads been around for a long time), so chances of M1 running Linux natively is slim.
[+] [-] zepto|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] motoboi|5 years ago|reply
Obviously it would take another canonical to do grunt driver creating work. But I suppose that if we don't see a quick response from intel or AMD, this hardware will take off and people will write the drivers.
[+] [-] unknown|5 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] Google234|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] djsumdog|5 years ago|reply
https://battlepenguin.com/tech/linux-on-a-macbook-pro-14-3/
With all the security on the newer Apple chips, I wonder if we'll ever see Linux boot on these things natively, much less get actual hardware driver support.
[+] [-] tyingq|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] osy|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] justincormack|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ogre_codes|5 years ago|reply
This is definitely in the experimental phase and not something for general use. The fact that there is a simple implementation is cool.
[+] [-] indigo747|5 years ago|reply
[0] https://github.com/machyve/xhyve
[+] [-] boris|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] the_af|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] legulere|5 years ago|reply
It says it's added to ARMv8.4 and M1 seems to be ARMv8.6, but I found no information if the M1 has these extensions.
[+] [-] my123|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nunez|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mekster|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tyingq|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bamboleo|5 years ago|reply
Apple needed to get the platform to the market and what they've done so far is everything they needed to do. They haven't even updated the whole line yet, so just give it time and let them improve the basics first (no, virtualization isn't "the basics")
[+] [-] ogre_codes|5 years ago|reply
As with the x86 Mac, Apple is relying on third party developers to take release full VM solutions.
[+] [-] wmf|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jki275|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Keverw|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] diminish|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] fanatic2pope|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] trianglem|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] wffurr|5 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] hu3|5 years ago|reply
And the post contains more information than the tweet. Forum users are sharing attatchments, repo links and their experiences.
[+] [-] jbirer|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] hans1729|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Cloudef|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nakovet|5 years ago|reply
Excluding smartphones/tablets, X86 has been the defacto computer architecture of personal computers. Microsoft tried an ARM processor but the tradeoffs were evident and it was considered half baked, leading to poor reviews.
For quite some time in our industry the main limitation has been clock speeds, nowadays the main limitation is temperature control.
Apple launched an ARM chipset that remains as cool as 50C when intel reaches 95C, this will forever change the industry of personal computing.
That's why people are raving about it.
[+] [-] _ph_|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sys_64738|5 years ago|reply
Given how Apple treats iPads and iPhones, I wouldn't be surprised if these M1 Macs have a much shorter usability period than Intel Macs.