My first attempts to install Ubuntu in native mode on this laptop failed during the installation process. I gave Parallels a try. Parallels is environment to create virtual machines under MacOSX. I was able to install Ubuntu in a Parallels VM. Unfortunately, Parallels does not allow you to mount the local filesystems in the VM. Your HFS or NTFS partitions are only accessible through Samba, which really slows things down. This makes the environment unsuitable for real day-to-day work. I tried again to install Ubuntu Feisty on my MacBook. The stock Feisty CD did not work right away. Ubuntu Edgy did, thanks to these instructions. I then upgraded to Feisty. The MacBook is now running Ubuntu Feisty in native mode.
There are still a few open issues:
- From the Refit boot-up screen, selecting the Windows partition actually starts Linux. However, I can start Windows from the Grub menu.
- Most of the time (but not all the time), the keyboard is unresponsive in Grub. It sometimes takes ten reboots to be able to use the keyboard. This is painful when you want to select an alternative kernel or Windows. I did implement the firmware update as recommended on the Refit site. It did not help.
- Startup is sloooow, even on powerful hardware. See the other posts for comparative results. This is not typical to Ubuntu. Actually, it seems more a “feature” of all Linux distributions. I have noticed the same behaviour on the server I am running with CentOS 4.4.
- WPA authentication often fails. This is apparently linked to the Gnome keyring manager. I do not have this issue with KDE. If I enter the details manually, it works.
If you have any suggestions to help solve these issues, your comments are most welcome.
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