Contents

MacBookAir (6,2) on Ubuntu 13.10 (Saucy Salamander)

MacBookAir (6,2) on Ubuntu 13.10 (Saucy Salamander)

This page aims to describe the steps needed, to fully enable all features of the 6-th Generation MacBookAir (release date: mid 2013) when using Ubuntu 13.10, Saucy Salamander.

IconsPage/terminal.png You can find out, what model you have by typing at the terminal:

sudo dmidecode -s system-product-name

If you have a different model, please go here and find the right wiki.

Overview

Anything not mentioned here probably already works out of the box. If not, please refer to the Ubuntu Apple Users forum.

Feature	Support status
LCD Panel
Suspend & Hibernate	Suspend ok, but LCD brightness can't be adjusted after resume. Hibernate not tried yet
Shut-down and Reboot
Keyboard functions (Brightness,volume,...)
Touchpad (appletouch)
Wireless (AirPort)
Bluetooth
iSight
Sound
Microphone	sound recoder is broken but recording with audacity works
External Monitor
Thunderbolt	To be verified
SD card slot
HFS+ (OS X disc partition)	mount read-only
Fan Control	according to `tlp stat`
Sensors (temps & fans)	according to `tlp stat`
GPU Power Save

IconsPage/ok.png (works out-of-the-box)
IconsPage/info.png (works, with remarks)
IconsPage/warning.png (needs manual install)
IconsPage/dont.png (won't work)
IconsPage/question.png (not yet documented)

Basic Installation Instructions

Common things about installing and maintaining Ubuntu on Intel-based Macs: Intel CPU-based Macintosh Generic Installation Instructions

Prerequisites

1. MacBookAir6,2

Check on OSX with sysctl hw.model Check on linux with sudo dmidecode -s system-product-name

2. Apple USB-Ethernet Adapter

3. USB-Stick (1GB at least)

4. ubuntu-13.10-desktop-amd64.iso.

Note: Do not use the 'amd64+mac' iso image as here the USB-Stick cannot boot. (Do not ask me why.)

Partition Harddisk

1. Boot Macbook Air into OSX

2. Open Disk Utility

open /Applications/Utility/Disk\ Utility.app

3. Select "Macintosh HD" > (Tab)Partition

Add (+) 3 more partitions
2nd Partition: Set 30-40GB for Ubuntu "/"
4th Partition: Set 4GB for Linux Swap partition
3rd Partition: Use as much space as left for "/home"

Prepare USB-Stick

1. In OSX

2. Download iso image to ~/Downloads

3. Open Terminal (a detailed description can be found here.

cd ~/Downloads
# convert iso
hdiutil convert -format UDRW -o ubuntu-13.10-desktop-amd64.img ubuntu-13.10-desktop-amd64.iso
open /Applications/Utilities/Disk\ Utility.app
# format the USB stick with MS-DOS VFAT
diskutil list
# check which /dev/diskX contains the USB stick - here it is "disk1"
# then unmount the usb-stick
diskutil unmountDisk /dev/disk1
# write img to usb stick - /!\ BE CAREFUL THAT disk1 REALLY IS YOUR USB-STICK
sudo dd if=ubuntu-13.10-desktop-amd64.img.dmg of=/dev/rdisk1 bs=1m

Install Ubuntu

1. Restart and press "Alt"-Key on startup.

2. Make sure that the USB-Ethernet Adapter is inserted. (With a network connection the bcmwl-kernel-source module gets downloaded during the installation process.

Select first USB-device labled "EFI-Boot" and press "Enter"
No splash screen shall be displayed but the Ubuntu installation menu. See Identifying if the computer boots the Ubuntu DVD in EFI mode. Select "Install Ubuntu" Note: If booting into BIOS-Mode is a bad choice as you can currently only run on one core. Bug

3. Choose "Something else" for partitioning.

Please check the sizes in the list according to the partitioning for the step above. OSX Disk Utility leaves unallocated partitions inbetween which usually are arround 128MB in size. Do not try to delete these "blank" partitions. 2nd partition should be ext4 formatted and mounted "/". 3rd partition should be ext3 formatted and mounted "/home". (I use ext3 in order to use fuse-ext2 from OSX; ext4 is yet not supported) 4th partition should be swap (no format and mountpoint required) Proceed...

4. The installation process should run through smoothly.

5. Restart with pressed "Alt"-Key.

Unfortunately selecting the "Windows" labled Partition (HD-icon) only displayed a black screen with a blinking cursor. Reboot into OSX again and install "refind".
Download Binary Zip-File Open a Terminal
```
cd Downloads
unzip  refind-bin-0.7.4.zip 
cd refind-bin-0.7.4
sudo ./install.sh 
```

6. Restart again. Now a Ubuntu labled "/efi/ubuntu/grubx64.efi" should be shown.

Select this an start it, now the grub-menu should be displayed. Select "Ubuntu". Now Ubuntu should boot.

Wireless (AirPort)

IconsPage/restricted.png

Requires an Apple USB-Ethernet Adapter.

1. Log into ubuntu 13.10 and open a terminal (Ctrl+Alt+t).

Attach Apple USB-Ethernet Adapter. Enter the following commands:
```
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get upgrade
```
This updates all packages

2. Start (Panel) > (Menu)System Settings > (Icon)Software & Updates (or from terminal /usr/bin/python3 /usr/bin/software-properties-gtk)

Select (Tab)Additional Drivers and install Broadcom 802.11 Linux STA wireless driver from bcmwl-kernel-source

3. Now reboot again

Select "Ubuntu"

Sound

Works.

Loudspeaker works, even if headset is attached. alsamixer running from termial is required to lower volume on loudspeaker while maintaining on headset.

iSight

IconsPage/webcam.png

iSight HD webcam does not work as Apple changed to PCI for higher resolution raw images. The camera is not recognized as USB device. The current iSight-Firmware cutter does not help here.

Touchpad (appletouch)

Works.

External Monitor

Requires at least kernel 3.11.6 - Take care with vanilla kernel as this might not contain the sound fix.

Function Keys

Works.

I personally prefer to use fn+Fkeys for the brightness and sound settings but leave the Fkeys for the applications without pressing fn. To change this behaviour

echo options hid_apple fnmode=2 | sudo tee -a /etc/modprobe.d/hid_apple.conf
sudo update-initramfs -u -k all

Then reboot. For further info on this topic check AppleKeyboard.

Finetuning Powersave functions

With the procedures enabled below ~10h on battery can be achieved.

1. Install powertop

```
sudo apt-get install powertop
sudo powertop
```
Toggle through with "TAB" to Tunables Lots of "Bad" values should be displayed.

2. Install TLP

For detailed Instructions refer to tpl wiki.

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:linrunner/tlp
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install tlp tlp-rdw

3. Edit tlp config /etc/default/tlp (only changes are shown)

DISK_IDLE_SECS_ON_AC=0
DISK_IDLE_SECS_ON_BAT=1
MAX_LOST_WORK_SECS_ON_BAT=15
DISK_APM_LEVEL_ON_BAT="1 1"
RUNTIME_PM_ALL=1
RESTORE_DEVICE_STATE_ON_STARTUP=1

Restart tpl with sudo /etc/init.d/tlp restart Check if settings took effect with powertop.

4. Enable more powersaving options

Put this script under /etc/pm/power.d/99macbookair6

#
# Macbook Air 6,2 power management script 
# copy to /etc/pm/power.d/99macbookair and chmod +x
#

#
# @param $1 idVendor
# @param $2 idProduct
# @param $3 type of powercontrol (on|auto)
#
set_usb_power_control() 
{
  for dev in /sys/bus/usb/devices/* ; do
    if [ -e $dev/idVendor -a \
       -e $dev/idProduct -a \
       -e $dev/power/control ] ; then
      if [ x`cat $dev/idVendor` = x$1 -a \
         x`cat $dev/idProduct` = x$2 ] ; then
         echo Setting $dev to $3
         echo $3 > $dev/power/control
      fi
    fi
  done
}

case "$1" in
  true) # powersaving on
    # lower brightness (value from 1 to 15)
    echo 600 > /sys/class/backlight/intel_backlight/brightness
    # lower keyboard brightness value
    echo 16 > /sys/class/leds/smc\:\:kbd_backlight/brightness

    # Autosuspend for USB device Apple Internal Keyboard / Trackpad [Apple Inc.]
    # This is not handled by `tlp`
    set_usb_power_control 05ac 0291 auto
    ;;
  false) # powersaving off
    ;;
  *)
    exit 254
    ;;
esac

exit 0

In /etc/rc.local add the following line:

/etc/pm/power.d/99macbookair6 true

5. Run sudo tlp stat

Still

/sys/module/i915/parameters/i915_enable_rc6  = -1 (use per-chip default)
/sys/module/i915/parameters/i915_enable_fbc  = -1 (use per-chip default)
/sys/module/i915/parameters/lvds_downclock   =  0 (disabled)
/sys/module/i915/parameters/semaphores       = -1 (use per-chip default)

Add the following line in /etc/default/grub

GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="pcie_aspm=force i915.i915_enable_rc6=1 i915.i915_enable_fbc=1 i915.lvds_downclock=1 acpi_backlight=vendor"

Then run sudo update-grub and reboot. After that:

/sys/module/i915/parameters/i915_enable_rc6  =  1 (enabled)
/sys/module/i915/parameters/i915_enable_fbc  =  1 (enabled)
/sys/module/i915/parameters/lvds_downclock   =  1 (enabled)
/sys/module/i915/parameters/semaphores       = -1 (use per-chip default)

CategoryMac

IconsPage/users.png
Please update this page, if you have figured out anything, that is not mentioned here!

IconsPage/users.png
The MactelSupportTeam is about to restructure and reorganize the documentation for Intel-based Macs. If you are interested in helping, please visit our team page for information. For all Mactel wikis, there is a starting place here. There is also a thread about planning the Mactel docummentation going on.

Ubuntu Documentation

MacBookAir6-2/Saucy

MacBookAir (6,2) on Ubuntu 13.10 (Saucy Salamander)

Overview

Basic Installation Instructions

Prerequisites

Partition Harddisk

Prepare USB-Stick

Install Ubuntu

Wireless (AirPort)

Sound

iSight

Touchpad (appletouch)

External Monitor

Function Keys

Finetuning Powersave functions