Sep 16, 2018 # Update Ubuntu to latest packages sudo apt update && sudo apt upgrade # These dependencies were noted by me on default Ubuntu 18.04 sudo apt install build-essential git pkg-config libmtdev-dev mtdev-tools xserver-xorg-dev xutils-dev. Then we’ll clone source code and compile the mtrack driver from its currently active repo: # execute line. Mar 01, 2019 Show activity on this post. I want to install Ubuntu 18.04 as the single OS on a MacbookAir3,1. In addition, I'd like to use the proprietary graphics drivers, but there are some known issues with that. I attempted to run the install while booted from USB drive, but the graphics issue seems to be preventing the thumdrive from booting all the way. This page is about installing Ubuntu on the Apple MacBook Air model. Discovering what MacBook Air you own. Open 'About This Mac' under the Apple menu; Click the 'System Report' button; The 'Model Identifier' will be in the default dialog. MacBook6,1(2) Apple MacBook Air 11' 2013 model(s).
Brief: Ubuntu provides an easy way to find and install proprietary drivers. This quick tutorial shows you how to install additional drivers in Ubuntu including Nvidia proprietary drivers.
To do app macbook. How do you install drivers in Ubuntu? The simple answer is that Ubuntu itself identifies and installs drivers on your system. Unlike older versions of Windows, you don’ have to manually search for and install drivers here.
But there is a catch. Some hardware components have several drivers available: open source ones and the proprietary ones.
By default, Ubuntu installs the open source drivers and in some cases, that causes problems in your Ubuntu install.
Opening it will bring you to the Standard Ubuntu boot menu, where you can choose Try Ubuntu to launch a live image. Method 3: Creating a Bootable USB Drive from Ubuntu. If you’re already on Ubuntu, you don’t need a Windows or Mac computer to create a bootable USB drive with Ubuntu – you can do it straight from your current OS. Hello Everybody, I’ve installed Ubuntu Mate 18.04 LTS in my Macbook Pro Retina 13' (mid 2014, model ID 11,1); I’d like to use it as my main operating system. During installation process, I’ve chosen the minimal installation, and then I’ve added the packages I need through Software Boutique and, as a second choice, Synaptic Packet Manager. At present everything works quite well, except.
You might face some issues with the wireless or the graphics card. Sometimes it’s because the open source version provided by the Linux distribution doesn’t work as good as the proprietary drivers provided by the hardware manufacturers.
The good thing is that Ubuntu is aware of these issues and this is why it provides an easy way to install additional proprietary drivers.
You may use these additional drivers to get better performance on your system. If you find them not working, you can revert easily .
In this tutorial, you’ll learn how to install additional drivers on Ubuntu. I’ll also show you how to install Nvidia proprietary drivers on Ubuntu.
Installing additional drivers in Ubuntu
Since a few versions now, Ubuntu doesn’t have Additional Drivers listed as a separate application. Instead, it now resides in the ‘Software & Updates’ app. From here, you can install drivers which are not installed by default during installation.
Let me show the exact steps for installing additional drivers.
Step 1: Go to Software Settings
Go to the menu by pressing the Windows key. In the search bar, type ‘drivers’. Click on ‘Software & Updates’ in the results.
Step 2: Check available additional drivers
Open the ‘Additional Drivers’ tab. Here you will be able to see all the devices you can install drivers for.
As shown in the image below, in case of other drivers like wireless drivers, you will get the option to either use the driver or to not use the device at all.
To use the install the drivers, select it and click on Apply Changes.
Step 3: Install the additional drivers
After the installation is complete, you will get a restart option. Click on it to restart your system and finish driver installation. The driver will be in use after the reboot.
If you ever want to go back to using the open source driver or disabling the device, you can open ‘Additional Drivers’ and select the corresponding option for that.
If you want to use the default driver instead of the proprietary one that you just installed, just select the option “Do not use the device” under that.
You can use lspci Linux command to check which graphics card do you have in your system.
Install Nvidia Proprietary Drivers in Ubuntu
Let’s see how to use Nvidia proprietary drivers on Ubuntu.
The question is, why would you do that in the first place? This is because the free and open source ‘nouveau’ driver may not properly support the graphics card’s functionality.
In a few cases, the system would not boot at all and gets stuck at journalctl . If you are facing the boot problem because of Nvidia drivers, you can expand the next section to fix that problem.
To work around this issue, you have to disable the ‘nouveau’ driver. You can do this using modprobe . modprobe is the kernel utility that allows us to enable or disable kernel drivers and modules during boot up.
On the grub screen, press ‘e’ to edit the command line.
Navigate to the line starting with ‘linux ‘ and add the following to the end of that line as shown in the image below. You can use the arrow keys to move the cursor.
After this, press F10 to boot and follow the rest of the simple steps. If your system still fails to boot (most probably systems with 900 series or 1000 series GPUs), you may need to add some more kernel parameters. Check this link for more information.
In the previous section, you have already learned how to see the additional drivers available for your system.
In this particular case, you can see the NVIDIA discrete graphics card has two driver options available. The open-source one and the proprietary one.
Click ‘Using NVIDIA driver metapackage ‘ to select the proprietary driver. Then click on the ‘ Apply Changes’ button to install the driver.
After installation is complete, you will get a restart button. Click on it to restart your PC and finish driver installation.
That’s it. You restart your PC and you should see Nvidia Graphics in action.
I hope this quick tutorial helped you with Nvidia drivers and additional drivers in Ubuntu. If you have questions or suggestions, please let us know.
I have been using a MacBook Air for both personal use and work since 2012. Apple’s hardware back then was top notch and reliable. When I did a feature and price comparison between a MacBook Air and other ultrabook offers, MacBook Air can easily rise up to the number one choice for a laptop that is portable, well-built and powerful enough at a reasonable price.
Fast forward to 2018. Apple is not itself anymore, at least in the interest of MacBook. Bad reviews and incidents of the MacBook line just happened one after another. Here are just a few:
- Apple’s slow on updating its laptops hardware
- The shallow and dirt-prone butterfly keyboards on the new MacBook and MacBook Pro
- The unwanted touch bar
- The core i9 chip MacBook throttling
- And for MacBook Air, its chips are now outdated (as of 08/2018) and worse its peripheral design hasn’t change since… forever.
With all of that, I seriously consider moving away from Apple walled garden and embrace Linux where I can freely choose hardware from other vendors.
However, my aged MacBook Air is still working great. So my strategy for now is to dual boot a Linux distro along with macOS on this machine, first to get familiar with modern Linux desktop experience, and secondly, to explore the tools and software that can replace my current ones on macOS.
My chosen distro is Ubuntu, because I am very much used to it, and it’s stable, especially on exotic hardware like MacBook Air. Besides, being the most popular Linux distro, it will be easier for me to find answers to issues if I come across.
At first I installed the default Ubuntu 18.04 with GNOME Shell and felt really irritated. After that I tried 2 other desktop environments: Pantheon (of Elementary OS) over Ubuntu 18.04 and MATE (full install of Ubuntu MATE 18.04). I kept a note name “Linux Grudges” to list down what I personally dislike and like about each desktop environments (desktop UI experience only, other functionalities are almost the same), so here they are:
GNOME Desktop & GNOME Shell (Standard Ubuntu): permalink
I tried GNOME 3 desktop with GNOME shell for the first time after long time with the old Unity DE and macOS. I have a lot of irritation with it and God forbid, GNOME shell, on the contrary to its claim, often steps in my way to get things done!
Like:
- Activities overview and Show applications screen
- Type to search anything (similar to macOS Spotlight)
- Dash to dock by default (this make GNOME Shell on Ubuntu suck less)
- Support legacy application indicators by default (this is another Ubuntu fix for GNOME Shell)
- Most GNOME apps support pixel perfect scrolling with touch pad
Dislike:
- A huge waste of space on the top panel and hide everything in the system tray and app menu dropdowns
- If I want to do anything, other than with current windows, I have to visit that Activities overview, like: launch another app, search for files, search for apps, switch workspace… which became annoying and distracting to current task
- It’s 2018 and people are moving away from hamburger menus and dropdowns. But for GNOME Apps, they hide everything in that menu
- Some of my favorite apps like Firefox, Sublime Text are still using fake smooth scrolling. (Not GNOME per se, but it just add up some irritation.)
- Crashy and sometimes CPU-hog GNOME Shell. I have to run:
gnome-shell --replace
once in a while.
If you’d like some more rants on the problematic GNOME 3, check out this post.
Pantheon Desktop on Ubuntu 18.04: permalink
I was curious about Elementary OS which has minimalist and similar UI to macOS, so I tried out its Pantheon DE on default Ubuntu 18.04.
Like:
- Simple but clean and aesthetic UI, resemble macOS
- It’s default Terminal app can use Ctrl-C & Ctrl-V for copy & paste
- Files explorer with column view similar to macOS Finder
- Nice and clean app store
Dislike:
- Terminal lack of customization (other shortcuts, color theme…)
- No global menu, so most of the top panel space is also wasted
- Old system tray icons won’t show at top bar (iBus, Fcitx, Electron apps…). This is show-stopper for me.
- Log out crash the session (may be due to Pantheon desktop on top Ubuntu, not real Elementary OS)
- Currently, its configuration ability is limited.
Ubuntu MATE: permalink
I tried Ubuntu MATE (with Unity-like layout) solely because I wanted the global menu which, for me, is the best solution of app menu. (Easier to target since it’s sticked to top edge; space of top panel is well used; and leave more working area for app window…). I did enjoy Ubuntu MATE and invested some tweaking with it. But after a while, I felt that the MATE experience is not very polished and feel dated.
Like:
- Low resource footprint
- Global menu
- HUD (menu items search like macOS)
- App Launcher (like macOS)
- Dock (again, like macOS)
Dislike:
- App switcher popup is too small and not having a thumbnail preview
- MATE doesn’t have something similar to Activities overview
- Panel icons occasionally hang, and have to restart with:
mate-panel --replace &
- Lack of theme dedicated for MATE desktop, and the default MATE themes, IMO, lack some taste
- Lack of animation (this should be fine if I’m on very old hardware)
- No built-in color profile manager (this is important, without custom color profile, MacBook Air screen color look very off)
Ubuntu Budgie: permalink
I learned about Ubuntu Budgie after I already chose my distro and DE. I did not tried it but viewed its screen cast walk-through. My immediate impression is that it’s just like another Elementary OS and still waste the top panel.
Settle on GNOME Desktop and GNOME Shell permalink
After actually trying the three different desktops, I decided, though, to settle on GNOME with these reasons:
- GNOME desktop has the most popular community and is actively developed.
- Crashy and resource-hog problems of GNOME Shell often come from lousy extensions. With some experiment and trials, I have spotted the problematic ones and removed them.
- Although it has many UX problems (that even Linus bashed it), it is still very configurable and extensible.
- After finding out Switcher, and Unite GNOME Shell extensions, GNOME desktop experience is now bearable for me.
- With the main Ubuntu distro chose GNOME as default desktop, I’m in hope that better GNOME enhancements will land from Ubuntu developers as they did for Unity.
- GNOME Shell has JavaScript API and its extensions are written with JavaScript; which really excites a JS guy like me that I’ll be able to jump into “hacking” my desktop real soon. I’m going through tutorials during spare time right now.
The journey has just begun permalink
Install Linux On Macbook Air
Apple command key. That said, I have been using Ubuntu on this MacBook Air for two months non-stop and have got used to it to the level of efficiency that I had with macOS.
Ubuntu 18 04 Macbook Air Driver
I did a lot of tweaks and configurations wherever I found it make sense and made the transition from macOS to Linux as quick as possible. For alternative software, I have also found most of the needed applications to avoid switching back to macOS.
Ubuntu 18 04 Macbook Air Download
If you are interested in installing Ubuntu on a MacBook, stay tuned. In the coming blog posts, I’ll share my experience and things I did to configure my current Ubuntu desktop, including: fixing GNOME shell with some extensions, making good use of the multi-touch touch pad, keyboard shortcuts and key swaps for Mac keyboard, fixing the screen color profile, mounting the APFS Macintosh drive, finding the software alternatives, and a lot more…