Mac mini (2,1) and Ubuntu 14.04 (Trusty)

This page aims to describe the steps needed to fully enable all features of the 2nd Generation Mac mini (release date: late 2007) on Ubuntu 14.04 LTS Trusty . You may want to read about some of this model's quirks by reading information on the Mac mini 2,1 page.

Under Ubuntu, you can verify that this is the model that you have by typing at the terminal:

sudo dmidecode -s system-product-name

This command should output Macmini2,1. If you have a different model, please go here and find the right wiki.

Installation Media

The Mac mini (2,1) must be installed from DVD. USB-based installers will not work. In addition, for a 64-bit installation, you must use an amd64+mac iso. The only difference is that EFI binaries are removed in the amd64+mac version (Source, answer #2) which allows the broken EFI implementation in Mac mini (2,1) to properly boot in BIOS compatibility mode.

Ubuntu

Ubuntu ISO Images can be found here:

• Ubuntu 14.04 64-bit ISOs (amd64+mac) [Recommended]

• Ubuntu 14.04 32-bit ISOs (i386)

Other Flavors

Other flavors of Ubuntu should install just fine if using their 32-bit installation media. But since this is a 64-bit system, we would prefer to install the 64-bit flavors. It seems that Lubuntu 14.04 is the only flavor actively building amd64+mac iso images. Since most Ubuntu flavors do not have specially made amd64+mac this presents a problem for installing something like Xubuntu.

Solution: Use the 64-bit Netboot Image.

Direct links to the mini.iso file can be found on the Minimal CD installation page. Though this provide a more rudimentary looking installer, this allows you to fully customize your Ubuntu installation. You can install all other flavors (Kubuntu, Xubuntu, Ubuntu Gnome, etc.) from this image. More help with this method can be found at the above links.

Overview

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