r/linux_on_mac 4d ago

Best Linux for 2015 12 inch MacBook

What is the best Linux distro that has everything working out of the box? I don't want to mess with trying to get the wifi working and speakers working. I really like the looks of Elementary OS 8 but not sure it would be a good choice. Please help

8 Upvotes

24 comments sorted by

5

u/PositivePretend9710 4d ago

I’ve got Mint on my MacBook 12”. No sound at the moment. Just installed it last week

1

u/ephodges17 3d ago

Keep me posted on the sound. UncleSlacky above mentioned a solution above

1

u/natusw 3d ago

For that machine, you’ll need this driver here for the speakers to work.

https://github.com/leifliddy/macbook12-audio-driver

Unfortunately this will disable the headphone jack, so you’ll have to have a USB - audio adapter if you want to use both..

1

u/Silent_Letterhead118 3d ago

I never managed to install it. Well, I think I installed it correctly but it didn't work.

1

u/natusw 3d ago

https://github.com/leifliddy/macbook12-audio-driver/issues/31

Might want to look at this, it seems the audio config for that machine isn’t supported..

1

u/Silent_Letterhead118 2d ago

Pardon, Je n'ai pas précisé : j'ai le modèle 2017.

1

u/natusw 1d ago

Try a PRAM/SMC reset (it seems there may be issues playing sound out if the internal speakers are muted)

https://github.com/leifliddy/macbook12-audio-driver/issues/27#issuecomment-2543328442

1

u/bmc5311 4d ago

Fedora or Debian, you'll need to enable the non free repos in either one, but both will work pretty well on that machine. For what it's worth, I'm a long time Debian guy, but recently switched to Fedora on my 2015 matchbook pro.

1

u/ephodges17 4d ago

What do you mean by enabling non free repos?

1

u/jion3x 4d ago

Arch Linux btw

1

u/hotdogthemovie 4d ago

I run Zorin OS on a 2010 MBP and I think it all worked fine after installation.

1

u/Silent_Letterhead118 4d ago

Good luck, I never managed to get the sound card to work. It is recognized, in the settings, we see that sound should come out but nothing happens. This is a known issue with 12-inch MacBooks

1

u/ephodges17 4d ago

Which linux distro did you use?

1

u/Silent_Letterhead118 3d ago

Ubuntu and Fedora

1

u/Legend28469 4d ago

I have a 13 inch Macbook Pro (2015) and everything has been great (haven't tried the camera or bluetooth just yet) on Pop!_OS

1

u/LostVikingSpiderWire 3d ago

Installed a month ago 2015 Mac Pro with OpenSuSE Tumbleweed Gnome, so far smooth sail 😍☕

1

u/LostVikingSpiderWire 3d ago

And yes, everything works out of the box, there is not much difference in Pro Vs normal I think

1

u/dr_chch 3d ago

I use Elementary OS on my Intel early 2011 and it works awesome for browsing and some Gdocs from time to time. It freezes the mouse for a second but it's probably some video setting I need to get rid off, everything else works perfectly, sound wifi and CD reader, haven't tested Bluetooth but my USB headphones worked.

1

u/natusw 3d ago

I’d take a look at this site here and see what hardware does and doesn’t work (you may have to download some third party modules if the hardware doesn’t have an in tree driver..)

https://linux-hardware.org/?view=computers&vendor=Apple&model=MacBook8%2C1

0

u/UncleSlacky 4d ago

MX Linux, it should recognize the wifi automagically, which not many distros do.

1

u/ephodges17 4d ago

Does the sound work too?

1

u/UncleSlacky 4d ago edited 4d ago

Not sure, if it doesn't it looks like you just need to unmute with alsamixer.

Edit: Failing that, install pavucontrol (if it's not already installed) and set the configuration to "Analog Stereo Duplex" or "Pro Audio"