4 ms·

I'm running Asahi Linux on the M2 and it's great. Drivers are not all complete yet, but it's awesome.

by jjtheblunt 4y ago

arjvik 4y ago
As your daily driver machine?
- jjtheblunt 4y ago
  i've not switched over to try that yet.
  - jjtheblunt 4y ago
    in my case i could use it as a daily driver, since i'm just needing a fast browser and Linux with compilers etc. but i've been using macos as a daily driver despite loathing (since the dawn of time) its font rendering. i'll switch at some point, probably.
    - garblegarble 4y ago
      >despite loathing (since the dawn of time) its font rendering. Could you expand on that a little please? I've always found the Mac's fonts & font rendering to be most pleasing so I'm interested to hear a different opinion - what annoys you about it?
      - jjtheblunt 4y ago
        i've got super sharp vision fortunately, so i see the half shading and such, and it strains my eyes which, otherwise, "expect" to bring edges into sharp contrast. My eyes love the rendering engine on Win11, or whatever trickery they're using for fonts, and similarly on ArchLinux.
        garblegarble 4y ago
        Oh I see, I thought it was the actual font rendering you disliked, I hadn't considered the smoothing being an issue! Between Apple's high DPI displays and my own eyesight I don't notice it (although I do remember when I was younger hating subpixel anti-aliasing when it was still in use, because of the rainbow around characters) For anyone who's interested, in macOS you can disable this font smoothing with: defaults -currentHost write -g AppleFontSmoothing -int 0
jonfw 4y ago
How is webcam and microphone support? Web conferencing always killed me running Linux even on well supported hardware How is battery life? What distro are you running? Are you doing all ARM binaries or is there some translation layer that works? Sorry to bombard you, but I’m really curious about the support
- coconut08 4y ago
  not the person you are responding to but i was looking into it today. webcam/mic/speakers don't work but bluetooth does. there is arm to x86/x86_64 translation tools akin to rosetta 2 but they have a lot of warts and are not well supported yet. the most promising one in my opinion is called fex.
- jjtheblunt 4y ago
  I've not tried the webcam and microphone, which I guess i could from Firefox. Battery life is less than when the drivers further evolve, because I think it's imperfect in going into sleep mode. The distro is Asahi Linux, which is ARM ArchLinux. All ARM binaries. If you follow the Asahi Linux page, it updates super frequently, as drivers get tuned and so on.
- heavyset_go 4y ago
  If you buy hardware supported by Linux, Zoom works well on it, including screen sharing. I've been using Zoom on my desktop with a USB camera for video calls and screen sharing for a while now. I was pleasantly surprised it actually worked and worked well. Edit: to clarify, this post is about Linux in general, I don't use M1 or M2 Macs with Linux.
  - xtracto 4y ago
    Why are you answering a question specifically made about M1 and M2 with a generic answer about a Desktop computer? What is the point?
    - heavyset_go 4y ago
      Here's what the GP says and what I'm discussing: > Web conferencing always killed me running Linux even on well supported hardware This is a forum for discussion, and that's what I'm participating in, a discussion. I am unsure why you believe that my reply must strictly address a question in manner that you deem suitable.
amelius 4y ago
It's great for you. But some of us are using Linux in industrial applications. You can't really put an Apple laptop inside e.g. an MRI machine. It may run highly specialized software, needs specific acceleration hardware, etc. It's going to be a very sad day when consumer electronics win over industrial applications.
- kergonath 4y ago
  What are you on about? A €5M MRI machine will have whatever computer its manufacturer will want to support. Which will probably be something like a Core 2 running Windows XP. None of these machines have used Macs, ever. Why would anything Apple does affect this market?
  - amelius 4y ago
    > Why would anything Apple does affect this market? Apple is gobbling up its supply chain and using precious fab slots. It affects others.
- JumpCrisscross 4y ago
  > can't really put an Apple laptop inside e.g. an MRI machine. It may run highly specialized software, needs specific acceleration hardware, etc. This sounds more like a pitch for letting the MRI machine talk to the laptop than putting redundant chips in every device.
  - rtlfe 4y ago
    > letting the MRI machine talk to the laptop than putting redundant chips in every device This sounds like a huge security risk.
    - 1-more 4y ago
      While MRIs don't use ionizing radiation like the Therac-25 did, I can think of a few bad outcomes from someone finding a 0-day on anything that can control the machine. And of course if it's read only it still has sensitive medical info we wouldn't want leaked. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Therac-25 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Therac-25
porphyra 4y ago
Does it have GPU acceleration yet? EDIT: apparently it does!!! https://asahilinux.org/2022/07/july-2022-release/ https://asahilinux.org/2022/07/july-2022-release/ Not perfect of course but this is surprisingly good progress in a short time.
- 58028641 4y ago
  OpenGL ES 2.0 could happen as early as the end of the year. Vulkan is a long way off.
  - porphyra 4y ago
    Apparently some old OpenGL games are already playable! https://rosenzweig.io/blog/asahi-gpu-part-6.html https://rosenzweig.io/blog/asahi-gpu-part-6.html
    - 58028641 4y ago
      That is running in macOS not Linux.
- NobodyNada 4y ago
  > apparently it does!!! Not in the public release yet. An experimental Mesa driver is running (https://rosenzweig.io/blog/asahi-gpu-part-6.html https://rosenzweig.io/blog/asahi-gpu-part-6.html), but the kernel driver is still a work in progress (though it's making quick progress!). The demo at the end of the article is a proof-of-concept with the M1 acting as an eGPU for another computer; not something usable for a desktop environment yet.

I'm running Asahi Linux on the M2 and it's great. Drivers are not all complete yet, but it's awesome.

arjvik 4y ago

As your daily driver machine?

jjtheblunt 4y ago
i've not switched over to try that yet.
- jjtheblunt 4y ago
  in my case i could use it as a daily driver, since i'm just needing a fast browser and Linux with compilers etc. but i've been using macos as a daily driver despite loathing (since the dawn of time) its font rendering. i'll switch at some point, probably.
  - garblegarble 4y ago
    >despite loathing (since the dawn of time) its font rendering. Could you expand on that a little please? I've always found the Mac's fonts & font rendering to be most pleasing so I'm interested to hear a different opinion - what annoys you about it?
    - jjtheblunt 4y ago
      i've got super sharp vision fortunately, so i see the half shading and such, and it strains my eyes which, otherwise, "expect" to bring edges into sharp contrast. My eyes love the rendering engine on Win11, or whatever trickery they're using for fonts, and similarly on ArchLinux.
      - garblegarble 4y ago
        Oh I see, I thought it was the actual font rendering you disliked, I hadn't considered the smoothing being an issue! Between Apple's high DPI displays and my own eyesight I don't notice it (although I do remember when I was younger hating subpixel anti-aliasing when it was still in use, because of the rainbow around characters) For anyone who's interested, in macOS you can disable this font smoothing with: defaults -currentHost write -g AppleFontSmoothing -int 0

jonfw 4y ago

How is webcam and microphone support? Web conferencing always killed me running Linux even on well supported hardware How is battery life? What distro are you running? Are you doing all ARM binaries or is there some translation layer that works? Sorry to bombard you, but I’m really curious about the support

coconut08 4y ago
not the person you are responding to but i was looking into it today. webcam/mic/speakers don't work but bluetooth does. there is arm to x86/x86_64 translation tools akin to rosetta 2 but they have a lot of warts and are not well supported yet. the most promising one in my opinion is called fex.
jjtheblunt 4y ago
I've not tried the webcam and microphone, which I guess i could from Firefox. Battery life is less than when the drivers further evolve, because I think it's imperfect in going into sleep mode. The distro is Asahi Linux, which is ARM ArchLinux. All ARM binaries. If you follow the Asahi Linux page, it updates super frequently, as drivers get tuned and so on.
heavyset_go 4y ago
If you buy hardware supported by Linux, Zoom works well on it, including screen sharing. I've been using Zoom on my desktop with a USB camera for video calls and screen sharing for a while now. I was pleasantly surprised it actually worked and worked well. Edit: to clarify, this post is about Linux in general, I don't use M1 or M2 Macs with Linux.
- xtracto 4y ago
  Why are you answering a question specifically made about M1 and M2 with a generic answer about a Desktop computer? What is the point?
  - heavyset_go 4y ago
    Here's what the GP says and what I'm discussing: > Web conferencing always killed me running Linux even on well supported hardware This is a forum for discussion, and that's what I'm participating in, a discussion. I am unsure why you believe that my reply must strictly address a question in manner that you deem suitable.

amelius 4y ago

It's great for you. But some of us are using Linux in industrial applications. You can't really put an Apple laptop inside e.g. an MRI machine. It may run highly specialized software, needs specific acceleration hardware, etc. It's going to be a very sad day when consumer electronics win over industrial applications.

kergonath 4y ago
What are you on about? A €5M MRI machine will have whatever computer its manufacturer will want to support. Which will probably be something like a Core 2 running Windows XP. None of these machines have used Macs, ever. Why would anything Apple does affect this market?
- amelius 4y ago
  > Why would anything Apple does affect this market? Apple is gobbling up its supply chain and using precious fab slots. It affects others.
JumpCrisscross 4y ago
> can't really put an Apple laptop inside e.g. an MRI machine. It may run highly specialized software, needs specific acceleration hardware, etc. This sounds more like a pitch for letting the MRI machine talk to the laptop than putting redundant chips in every device.
- rtlfe 4y ago
  > letting the MRI machine talk to the laptop than putting redundant chips in every device This sounds like a huge security risk.
  - 1-more 4y ago
    While MRIs don't use ionizing radiation like the Therac-25 did, I can think of a few bad outcomes from someone finding a 0-day on anything that can control the machine. And of course if it's read only it still has sensitive medical info we wouldn't want leaked. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Therac-25 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Therac-25

porphyra 4y ago

Does it have GPU acceleration yet? EDIT: apparently it does!!! https://asahilinux.org/2022/07/july-2022-release/ https://asahilinux.org/2022/07/july-2022-release/ Not perfect of course but this is surprisingly good progress in a short time.

58028641 4y ago
OpenGL ES 2.0 could happen as early as the end of the year. Vulkan is a long way off.
- porphyra 4y ago
  Apparently some old OpenGL games are already playable! https://rosenzweig.io/blog/asahi-gpu-part-6.html https://rosenzweig.io/blog/asahi-gpu-part-6.html
  - 58028641 4y ago
    That is running in macOS not Linux.
NobodyNada 4y ago
> apparently it does!!! Not in the public release yet. An experimental Mesa driver is running (https://rosenzweig.io/blog/asahi-gpu-part-6.html https://rosenzweig.io/blog/asahi-gpu-part-6.html), but the kernel driver is still a work in progress (though it's making quick progress!). The demo at the end of the article is a proof-of-concept with the M1 acting as an eGPU for another computer; not something usable for a desktop environment yet.