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Asahi Linux Still Working on Apple M3 Support, M1n1 Bootloader Going Rust

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Re: Asahi Linux Still Working on Apple M3 Support, M1n1 Bootloader Going Rust

#211

Post by mistrial9 »

smith7018 wrote: post #197
cchance wrote: post #141

I honestly dont get why apple isn't more open with their drivers and stuff to get linux working on macbooks, they don't charge for macos, most of their profit comes from hardware it feels like opening up macbooks to be used by people that are linux diehards would just open up more sales

Most of their profits come from software or ecosystem lock ins. So while they do profit off of each Mac sold, if those sales don't translate to more iCloud subscriptions, app purchases, or iPhones then it really doesn't make financial sense for them. Even if they only had 3 people and a PM dedicated to Linux support, that's still roughly a million dollars a year for a nebulous promise of "slightly more hardware sales…

casual observers "discover" that Apple is deeply controlling with regards to monetization.. sharing or open-for-its-own-sake are not welcome

Re: Asahi Linux Still Working on Apple M3 Support, M1n1 Bootloader Going Rust

#212

Post by [deleted] »

baby wrote: post #209
mort96 wrote: post #5

I have a 2021 MacBook Pro with an M1 Pro. It's getting a bit old, so it would be nice to replace it with a new MacBook Pro in not too long. But honestly, losing Linux support would be pretty devastating. Docker and virtualization just isn't the same. There's lots of interesting stuff you can do with your hardware in Linux, there's for example Linux-specific software which puts the WiFi card in promiscuous mode and do…

Why is docker so bad on mac and why is apple not fixing that?

[deleted]

Re: Asahi Linux Still Working on Apple M3 Support, M1n1 Bootloader Going Rust

#213

Post by [deleted] »

smith7018 wrote: post #197
cchance wrote: post #141

I honestly dont get why apple isn't more open with their drivers and stuff to get linux working on macbooks, they don't charge for macos, most of their profit comes from hardware it feels like opening up macbooks to be used by people that are linux diehards would just open up more sales

Most of their profits come from software or ecosystem lock ins. So while they do profit off of each Mac sold, if those sales don't translate to more iCloud subscriptions, app purchases, or iPhones then it really doesn't make financial sense for them. Even if they only had 3 people and a PM dedicated to Linux support, that's still roughly a million dollars a year for a nebulous promise of "slightly more hardware sales…

[deleted]

Re: Asahi Linux Still Working on Apple M3 Support, M1n1 Bootloader Going Rust

#214

Post by selectodude »

entropicdrifter wrote: post #117
mort96 wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Completely depends on what you're doing. If you're working on GUI software for example, you need to run that on your local machine. This is much easier if you're compiling and running the software on the same machine. Then there are non-development tasks, like 3D modelling or video editing. Remote desktop is a kind of solution, but it's extremely sub par. Latency is not good unless you're on the same LAN in my experi…

Ever try Parsec or Moonlight/Sunshine? They're very low latency because they're made for gaming

There’s a latency cost to encode and decode, and there’s a definite PQ change going from uncompressed video to h.265.

Re: Asahi Linux Still Working on Apple M3 Support, M1n1 Bootloader Going Rust

#215

Post by Analemma_ »

cchance wrote: post #141

I honestly dont get why apple isn't more open with their drivers and stuff to get linux working on macbooks, they don't charge for macos, most of their profit comes from hardware it feels like opening up macbooks to be used by people that are linux diehards would just open up more sales

As other comments have mentioned, they have kind of a "total hands-off; neither help nor hinder" policy around 3rd-party operating systems on Apple Silicon. They aren't providing any kind of assistance, but they aren't doing anything to obstruct it either: even though the Linux drivers have to be reverse-engineered, the actual installation process is very easy and not inhibited at all by the extensive cryptographic boot chain protections built into macOS, even though it easily could be. And as far as I know, what little they have said publicly about this is that they don't intend to ever try and actively block Linux.

So in that sense I think it's mostly just a resources thing: they don't feel it's worth their time and money to assist this process. Which, honestly, I can't get that upset about: we're not entitled to Apple spending resources to help people install other operating systems on their hardware; so long as they don't actively impede the process I see no reason to get upset.

Re: Asahi Linux Still Working on Apple M3 Support, M1n1 Bootloader Going Rust

#216

Post by pimeys »

Difwif wrote: post #182
ActorNightly wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I'm not really sure what to do. Get any of the modern laptops with good battery life, install linux + Elementary OS without any hacks or workarounds (or better yet, i3wm which is the best window manager for laptops), and never look back. Or do what I do, which is buy $200 dells/thinkpads of ebay, and for anything requiring CPU, just ssh into your home server. Personally I went a step further and use a lapdock with a…

I used to be in this camp until I tried and bought an M1 Macbook as my daily driver. I thought I was going to be Thinkpad/XPS w/ Linux until I die. I don't love MacOS but POSIX is mostly good enough for me and the hardware is so good that I'm willing to look past the shortfalls. Seriously I would love to switch back to a full-time Linux distro but I'm more interested in getting work done and having a stable & perform…

I'm not really sure what you mean? I've been in fast and crazy startups now years, all the time ton of work to do. Never having issues with Linux, the CachyOS and Fedora spins I run just keep on chugging day to day.

Using a workstation and an AMD Thinkpad.

Re: Asahi Linux Still Working on Apple M3 Support, M1n1 Bootloader Going Rust

#217

Post by latexr »

bigyabai wrote: post #207
latexr wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And do you think it makes sense to argue that someone who says “macOS sucks big time” but likes their hardware has an “unhealthy emotional attachment to Apple”? If anything, it seems to show a pragmatic relationship (that whatever you like/need from each).

If someone likes their partner's body, but despises their personality and the way they treat them, I would call that an unhealthy emotional attachment, not a pragmatic relationship. It's almost never pragmatic to assume that your own suffering will necessarily yield a better outcome. Maybe your smoking hot partner eventually becomes a better person, but is it worth investing 10 years of mental anguish for the chance…

> If someone likes their partner's body, but despises their personality and the way they treat them

Then they have to take the whole package or nothing at all. You can’t swap your partner’s brain. But you can change your OS on your computer. These things are not comparable.

> macOS sucks because their customers have an unhealthy emotional attachment to Apple.

No, macOS (currently) sucks because Apple is doing a bad job. Their customers’ relationship to the company is orthogonal to the OS’ quality.

Re: Asahi Linux Still Working on Apple M3 Support, M1n1 Bootloader Going Rust

#218

Post by jcalvinowens »

jcalvinowens wrote: post #152
TimTheTinker wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I suppose for folks here, they like being able to do dev work (as well as web browsing) on a fast laptop with low power draw. Sounds like that's not exactly your use case.

> they like being able to do dev work (as well as web browsing) on a fast laptop with low power draw. I guess that's hard for me to understand... do you just not have to compile things? Or do you just not mind waiting? No matter how exceptional the laptops are for laptops, a real computer plugged into a wall is always going to vastly outperform them...

To add a bit (I wrote this in response to a deleted comment):

The yocto build I'm currently working on takes about six hours to complete on my biggest machine. Yes, it's an incremental build, but warming up a laptop would require several days of 100% CPU :)

It's also not really possible to test locally, even a VM of the right architecture is insufficient without doing a bunch of work to make it match the target hardware.

Often you can build a quick little ad hoc thing that lets you test some piece of it locally, but sometimes it's too much work.

Frequently I need to compile test several dozen Linux kernel configurations with different cross compilers, each of which takes half an hour to run on the huge box.

I can't imagine doing any of this locally on a single laptop, I would get 1% as much done as I currently do.

Re: Asahi Linux Still Working on Apple M3 Support, M1n1 Bootloader Going Rust

#219

Post by saratogacx »

xxpor wrote: post #81
dangus wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My advice is if you’re truly a Linux user first, give up the idea that Mac hardware is the only best/acceptable hardware. Break the cycle and don’t just buy Apple because their hardware is 10% better than competitors. The market really isn’t limited to “buying a windows laptop and putting Linux onto it” anymore. Lots of OEMs support Linux as a first-class citizen. For me personally I’m enjoying my Framework laptop a…

My only issue with Intel at this point is Lunar Lake only supports 32GB of RAM max. If it supported 64GB, I'd buy it today.

I believe that Arrow Lake supports 64gb. I'm waiting on availability before I replace my aging (9yo) Lenovo X1 Yoga.

Re: Asahi Linux Still Working on Apple M3 Support, M1n1 Bootloader Going Rust

#220

Post by renewiltord »

mort96 wrote: post #77
hanikesn wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I'm not really sure what to do. Maybe this MacBook Pro was just a one-off, and I have to go back to buying Windows laptops and putting Linux on them. But they just aren't as nice. Why would you think that? They're working hard on upstreaming all patches ATM, adding new hardware support will be much easier afterwards.

And what's the ETA for M5 support?

It's funny that this exact question is mentioned in marcan's "I'm leaving Asahi Linux" blogpost, haha.

> And, of course, “When is M3/M4 support coming?”

https://marcan.st/2025/02/resigning-as-asahi-linux-project-l...

It's just amusing to me that Linux users since the beginning of time have been working hard on ensuring the maintainers of their software get upset at them and quit working on their software.

Over decades of seeing this, it is entertaining that people never change. There will be a great beauty to the vim v emacs wars in 5723 CE between the people of Gliese 251b and Gliese 251c.

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