Getting An Old MacBook Air & Installing Linux (Ubuntu? Mint?). Any Advice?

I've got a 2011 MacBook Pro with a 2012 MBP logic board in it as my original GPU was dying. I've not run MacOS on it in quite some time; in fact, right now I'm running EndeavourOS (I like Arch, but going through installing Arch on this like I have in the past is a pain with getting all the drivers needed for the hardware and EOS just works) and use it daily. Battery life leaves a lot to be desired, but it's to be expected for a laptop of its age with a power hungry i7 CPU.

I feel as though Ubuntu has lost its way, though plenty of people still love it. I'm a huge advocate for Mint, whether it's the Ubuntu-based version or LMDE; both are solid options! Mint is actually what I was running on the 2011 MBP just before I moved back to an Arch-based OS.

I've also got a 2015 MacBook Air that's running pure Arch with a basic window manager and that's it. Steam is on it and works good enough for older games! Go for it!

Absolutely give it a shot undoubtedly with so many distros out there that you’ll get ten ppl respond with ten different distros LOL.

I am a fan of MX Linux+XFCE desktop on early Intel Macs. Give a few a try and see which works best for you. I mean they’re all free so why not ? I think MX is pretty great though especially for someone getting into the pool for the first time.

Good luck.

I love Mint! I think it's a great beginner distro, as well, for people who want to make a switch from Windows.

I've always preferred Mint over Ubuntu.

Ubuntu's default window manager seems to be built around a touch interface. It's nearly unusable with keyboard and mouse.

No drawbacks to Mint. You get the same packages.

Why Mint over Ubuntu, how has it "lost its way?"


edit: AHA! you beat me to the post. I guess I may need to give Mint a try on one the HP ProBooks in the herd. A dock for a third one should be here this week and two docks are set up on my KVM setup right now. Win10 and Ubuntu so far. One came with Win11 installed, pulled that disk right out!

2112st said:

What do folks think of running Linux Mint? I'm currently eyeing that one. Again, aside from writing fiction, I'm not sure what else I could do on the Air, but it would be interesting to explore-though I'm not really a game person.

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I've not used Mint but its default Cinnamon layout looks nice & spacious and easy on the eyes with its dark theme. I'm sure I'd like it just fine One thing to consider is if you find Cinnamon to be sluggish on that 2012 air, xfce will bring a snappier experience. It is an option with Mint as well. What are the specs of your 2012 mba? Good luck

I love Cinnamon, but Xfce is just as awesome; super lightweight.

If graphical horsepower isn't an issue, I will go KDE Plasma every time. I just love it! I did originally have Arch with KDE on this MacBook Pro and it ran it just fine, but when I moved from Mint to EndeavourOS I opted for Xfce just to help with battery life (as much as one can on battery this old!)

2112st said:

BTW, I own a 2012 MacBook Air, and I think it's FANTASTIC. For writers, it's awesome. But I have MacOS on it and want to keep it on there.

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Upgrade the SSD to something larger, then you can dual-boot both OS X and Mint or whichever distro of Linux you decide on. Am doing something similar to a client's 2013 MBA, albeit, keeping it OS X. The stock 128GB SSD is full, plus he would like to be able to get rid of his original 2009 A1278 MacBook Pro that he only uses for invoices in QuickBooks. So, picked up a 1TB SSD and will use Carbon Copy Cloner to clone the High Sierra install to one partition, and the same app to clone his MBP's Yosemite install to the other. Gets him down from five Macs, ranging from a 2007 or 2008 iMac to a 2020 MacBook Air, to four. The iMac, the aforementioned A1466 I'm going to be upgrading, his mid-2012 A1286, and the A2179 mentioned in the previous sentence.