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Anyone here replaced their MacOs with Linux
- Thread starter Android300zx
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Replace a real Unix with a pseudo-Unix? Why? If you think you need Linux for something, why would you buy a Mac to run it?
It was moreso to run packet analysis for Wireshark but on the Linux platform only. I understand that it's available for Windows and Mac but it's a skill for a potential job.
About 15 years ago, I've been installing SUSE Linux on a PPC 9500. After a while I reverted back to Mac OS 9.1. With recent Mac models I'm running various Linux systems inside a Virtual Box and can't report on how good they'll run natively. Most critical are probably adequate support of power management, HI-DPI Retina resolution and drivers for the I/O ports (Thunderbolt to Ethernet, etc.) without flaws.
If you want some Linux running natively on your Mac any Live CD of a Linux distro should give you a taste of what you can expect. Maybe you even like continuing to have macOS installed as your primary OS on your internal drive and just occasionally boot up Linux from a live USB flash drive. If that's not an option, why not consider Dual Boot (rEFInd)?
After some long research a year back, IMHO there is currently no desktop Linux that would really make sense to run natively, if one can run macOS. There might be some good reasons for running a Linux server box with no GUI at all, especially to utilise some older Mac hardware for server tasks, but why not run FreeBSD then?
However, if you ask yourself, what Live-CD to try:
1.) Close to the look of macOS comes Mageia or elementary OS.
2.) Debian is used by plenty of institutes and governments and is quite stable.
3.) The Debian derivate Kali Linux comes with Wireshark out of the box.
Of course it depends on your needs which distro fits you best and maybe Open SUSE, Ubuntu, Cent OS or one of the many other Linux systems is going to better suit you or could work better on your hardware natively. If you want to learn everything about Linux, then Linux From Scratch is your route to go.
To get a live CD installed on an USB flash drive there are various helper tools like UNetbootin or Mac Linux USB Loader available.
If you want some Linux running natively on your Mac any Live CD of a Linux distro should give you a taste of what you can expect. Maybe you even like continuing to have macOS installed as your primary OS on your internal drive and just occasionally boot up Linux from a live USB flash drive. If that's not an option, why not consider Dual Boot (rEFInd)?
After some long research a year back, IMHO there is currently no desktop Linux that would really make sense to run natively, if one can run macOS. There might be some good reasons for running a Linux server box with no GUI at all, especially to utilise some older Mac hardware for server tasks, but why not run FreeBSD then?
However, if you ask yourself, what Live-CD to try:
1.) Close to the look of macOS comes Mageia or elementary OS.
2.) Debian is used by plenty of institutes and governments and is quite stable.
3.) The Debian derivate Kali Linux comes with Wireshark out of the box.
Of course it depends on your needs which distro fits you best and maybe Open SUSE, Ubuntu, Cent OS or one of the many other Linux systems is going to better suit you or could work better on your hardware natively. If you want to learn everything about Linux, then Linux From Scratch is your route to go.
To get a live CD installed on an USB flash drive there are various helper tools like UNetbootin or Mac Linux USB Loader available.
This describes the troubles I've run into when experimenting with linux on my macs over the years.
The killer for me (for the surface pro too) is that sleep isnt supported on macbooks with linux at the moment.
I had to jump through hoops with some weird kernel boot options in order to get Linux to boot on my 2015 iMac. It works as expected once it is running though. Mac OS is just more reliable and has more software. My Linux days are done, I run them now on a virtual machine just for fun occasionally.
If you want as little hassle as possible, get a non-Apple business laptop with integrated graphics on which to run Linux. Get a used one if you want to keep costs down.
Ahem!!!!
Even though OS X eventually got Unix certification the OS is actually built on Mach, a hybrid kernel.
Many people don’t know Apple did have another Unix OS back in the late 80s.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/A/UX