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Allow me to explain how you are wrong. One big issue with Linux is driver maintenance. If a distro can focus on just one set of hardware (e.g. M1 Macs), it all

Allow me to explain how you are wrong. One big issue with Linux is driver maintenance. If a distro can focus on just one set of hardware (e.g. M1 Macs), it allows the developers to optimize the distro massively. It also makes everything more predictable, and saves a lot of time. Not to mention that the M1 macbooks have outstanding displays, speakers, mics, etc. Imagine a world where the distro has perfect drivers out of the box, and we don't need to use some subpar nouveau driver (when I say subpar, I'm speaking relative to the official drivers). Not to mention that most people run Linux on crappy $1000 laptops. An M1 air is around that price range, and destroys anything in that particular market space. This could be massive for Linux desktops. I feel like the one thing that has been holding it back has been this very issue. It even opens up the door to reverse engineering the Apple hardware and perhaps creating a complete open source integrated system in the future. It matters, and it could be the thing that rocket blasts Linux into more normies homes.

ChuckNorris89 5y ago
>Allow me to explain how you are wrong. [..] I feel like the one thing that has been holding it back has been this very issue. Allow me to explain how you're wrong. How often have you heard a normie Average Joe that's tech illiterate and just buys Macs or Walmart PCs and doesn't even know that their machine runs MacOS or Windows or that their iPhone runs iOS or that their Samsung phone runs Android (basically your average boomer dad), say "Gee wizz, I would totally wish I could run Linux on some decent HW, if only Linux driver support for Macs were better". lol You're delusional if you think Linux market share on laptops/desktops will explode when the driver situation improves. 99,99% of people who will buy Macs will keep using MacOS. Most people buy into the Apple ecosystem for the ecosystem, and apart from some geeks/tech workers, they're not gonna start installing Linux on them. My point is, you're massively overestimating how many Mac users (outside of geek tech bubbles) would actually daily drive Linux on them. And even in the geek/tech bubbles, most will probably play with Linux on their M1 Macs for a day, and once they see that the trackpad movement is worse than MacOS and there's some screen taring due to some driver/wayland issue, they'll reboot and revert back to daily driving MacOS. Rinse and repeat in an year when it will finally be "year of the Linux". The "year of Linux" on the desktop/laptop hasn't yet happened not because people couldn't run Linux on their Macs but because of countless of other factors, the biggest of which being that the average consumer doesn't know, want or care to install another OS than the one that came with their machine out of the factory.
- zozbot234 5y ago
  Linux gets installed on Mac hardware when it's no longer supported by Mac OS. This can extend the lifetime and value of the hardware well beyond the value of a "stock" OS install.
  - ChuckNorris89 5y ago
    Yeah, but my point was how many users of Macs actually install Linux o their Macs? Is it a significant share of the MacOS market making this switch, or is it basically just a rounding error in the grand scheme of things? And to correct you, Linux GOT installed on Macs when they had standard PC HW so Linux kernels had native support for them, but in the current state of Linux on the M1, there's so many things not working[1] due to Apple not using PC HW anymore, that I doubt Linux will be suitable for daily driving on M1/ARM Macs anywhere near it was on X86 Macs anytime soon. And I doubt Mac users will put up with Linux on their M1 machines if a lot of peripherals that worked on MacOS, don't work well on Linux. [1]What doesn’t work DisplayPort Thunderbolt HDMI on the MacBooks Bluetooth GPU acceleration Video codec acceleration Neural Engine CPU deep idle Sleep mode Camera Touch Bar
  - inDigiNeous 5y ago
    Currently running Big Sur on a 2014 MacBook Pro. I have a hard time imagining installing Linux on a machine that is over 7 years old (currently macOS backwards compatibility is about 7 years backwards, depending a bit on your model). I mean ok some people will do that but at that point the machine starts to either obsolete or there is something wrong with it already. Why not just run a macOS that is couple of versions older, than install some Linux that probably can't even sleep properly..
    - jckahn 5y ago
      I installed Ubuntu 20.04 onto a 2010 Mac Mini that can only run MacOS Mavericks at best. It crashes less with Ubuntu and meets my home server needs better than it ever could running MacOS.
moltke 5y ago
Distro devs don't maintain drivers, kernel devs do that. That's part of why embedded firmware authors like Linux: you get a ton of drivers for free with minimal effort.
nrdvana 5y ago
Lenovo ThinkPads actually have manufacturer support for Linux for quite a long time. (to the degree that there is actually a BIOS menu option for Linux sleep states specifically labeled as such) I've used ThinkPads for the last 10 years and had perfect support running Linux Mint. Don't get me wrong, it will be nice to have another manufacturer to choose from with excellent Linux support, but as it sounds, they aren't there yet with this new distro. So... I'll keep using ThinkPads for now. Also I despise glossy screens. So I'll probably never want a macbook anyway.

ChuckNorris89 5y ago

>Allow me to explain how you are wrong. [..] I feel like the one thing that has been holding it back has been this very issue. Allow me to explain how you're wrong. How often have you heard a normie Average Joe that's tech illiterate and just buys Macs or Walmart PCs and doesn't even know that their machine runs MacOS or Windows or that their iPhone runs iOS or that their Samsung phone runs Android (basically your average boomer dad), say "Gee wizz, I would totally wish I could run Linux on some decent HW, if only Linux driver support for Macs were better". lol You're delusional if you think Linux market share on laptops/desktops will explode when the driver situation improves. 99,99% of people who will buy Macs will keep using MacOS. Most people buy into the Apple ecosystem for the ecosystem, and apart from some geeks/tech workers, they're not gonna start installing Linux on them. My point is, you're massively overestimating how many Mac users (outside of geek tech bubbles) would actually daily drive Linux on them. And even in the geek/tech bubbles, most will probably play with Linux on their M1 Macs for a day, and once they see that the trackpad movement is worse than MacOS and there's some screen taring due to some driver/wayland issue, they'll reboot and revert back to daily driving MacOS. Rinse and repeat in an year when it will finally be "year of the Linux". The "year of Linux" on the desktop/laptop hasn't yet happened not because people couldn't run Linux on their Macs but because of countless of other factors, the biggest of which being that the average consumer doesn't know, want or care to install another OS than the one that came with their machine out of the factory.

zozbot234 5y ago
Linux gets installed on Mac hardware when it's no longer supported by Mac OS. This can extend the lifetime and value of the hardware well beyond the value of a "stock" OS install.
- ChuckNorris89 5y ago
  Yeah, but my point was how many users of Macs actually install Linux o their Macs? Is it a significant share of the MacOS market making this switch, or is it basically just a rounding error in the grand scheme of things? And to correct you, Linux GOT installed on Macs when they had standard PC HW so Linux kernels had native support for them, but in the current state of Linux on the M1, there's so many things not working[1] due to Apple not using PC HW anymore, that I doubt Linux will be suitable for daily driving on M1/ARM Macs anywhere near it was on X86 Macs anytime soon. And I doubt Mac users will put up with Linux on their M1 machines if a lot of peripherals that worked on MacOS, don't work well on Linux. [1]What doesn’t work DisplayPort Thunderbolt HDMI on the MacBooks Bluetooth GPU acceleration Video codec acceleration Neural Engine CPU deep idle Sleep mode Camera Touch Bar
- inDigiNeous 5y ago
  Currently running Big Sur on a 2014 MacBook Pro. I have a hard time imagining installing Linux on a machine that is over 7 years old (currently macOS backwards compatibility is about 7 years backwards, depending a bit on your model). I mean ok some people will do that but at that point the machine starts to either obsolete or there is something wrong with it already. Why not just run a macOS that is couple of versions older, than install some Linux that probably can't even sleep properly..
  - jckahn 5y ago
    I installed Ubuntu 20.04 onto a 2010 Mac Mini that can only run MacOS Mavericks at best. It crashes less with Ubuntu and meets my home server needs better than it ever could running MacOS.

moltke 5y ago

Distro devs don't maintain drivers, kernel devs do that. That's part of why embedded firmware authors like Linux: you get a ton of drivers for free with minimal effort.

nrdvana 5y ago

Lenovo ThinkPads actually have manufacturer support for Linux for quite a long time. (to the degree that there is actually a BIOS menu option for Linux sleep states specifically labeled as such) I've used ThinkPads for the last 10 years and had perfect support running Linux Mint. Don't get me wrong, it will be nice to have another manufacturer to choose from with excellent Linux support, but as it sounds, they aren't there yet with this new distro. So... I'll keep using ThinkPads for now. Also I despise glossy screens. So I'll probably never want a macbook anyway.