No ZDNET, Linux 6.2 WILL NOT Run On M1 Macs

Key Takeaways

it has been probably a good couple of months since I last discussed Asahi Linux as a quick refresher this is the project to get Linux running on the Apple silicon they've been plodding along making new drivers new user space tools improving that stuff and slowly getting things upstreamed and very recently this article came out from ZDNet Linux 6.2 the first mainstream Linux kernel for Apple M1 chips arrive Linux is now ready to run on Modern Macs that sounds great it makes it sound like if you download the next version of Ubuntu the next version of Fedora a newer kernel on Arch Linux you can just run out on Apple silicon no problem whatsoever now I generally like ZDNet at least as like a surface level local at General Tech stuff so you know something's kind of happening but sometimes the Articles aren't super great so from about here to here as in the parts where it's not talking about the work being done with Asahi Linux articles great besides that though there are some pretty serious problems this article is very bad and that's not just me saying this this is what the Asahi Linux team had to say this article is misleading and borderline false you will not be able to run Ubuntu nor any other standard distro with 6.2 on any M1 Mac please don't get your hopes up so then what's so wrong about it surely this is just hyperbole is not that big of a deal it's like a misused word a misused term where it seems correct if you're a tech journalist but if you're really involved in the field it obviously is wrong well let's start with the title Linux get out my way Linux 6.2 the first mainstream Linux kernel for Apple M1 chips arrives this isn't even like a click Beatty kinda wrong this is just blatantly disagree regarding reality as said by the Asahi Linux team we are continuously upstreaming kernel features and 6.2 notably adds device trees and basic boot support for M1 Pro Max and Ultra machines this can very clearly be seen with a tiny tiny bit of research this is from the Asahi Linux documentation about feature support this tells you when different features were Upstream when they were involved in RC Linux and where exactly they are in their stage of development and it is absolutely true that things were added in 6.2 like CPU Frac and all of the other things that were mentioned in that tweet but what about the features merged in 6.1 how about 5.19 5.18 5.17 5.16 going all the way back to the earliest things being upstreamed 5 5.13 released the end of June 2021 in this supposed mainstream Linux kernel that's now ready to run on Modern Macs they haven't Upstream the trackpad and keyboard drivers there's other things like say the webcam driver I can't spell webcam the webcam driver or the uh three and a half millimeter Jack or a bunch of other stuff that some cases haven't even be started yet on some of the models in no world do you see a feature table that looks like this with so many things that need to be worked on and so many things that need to be upstreamed where you can say this is mainstream ready it's so far from that this is for developers and people who know exactly what they're doing with Linux this is not for just your regular average Linux user to just slap on a machine and expect it to be good for daily driving with everything not to say you can't daily driver I know some people will but it's not ready for just your average person yet and later in the article it says today this support is finally ready for Mainline Linux users of course it's all experimental at this point I would call some of it non-existent but sure we'll go with experimental but it won't be for much longer Linux 6.2 is expected to become Ubuntu 23.04's default kernel true and to be included in Fedora 38 before the late April release of 6.3 also true but let's just assume okay this is so far from true but let's just assume that all of these features had been upstreamed every single kernel feature was already in the kernel was already done and already working with no bugs whatsoever even then you would still not be able to just go and install Linux on an M1 Mac and have it work our goal is to Upstream everything but that doesn't mean distros instantly get apple silicon support as with many other platforms there is some integration work required distros need to package our user space tooling and at this time offer 16k kernels so the most obvious thing with this tooling is the bootloader so Asahi Linux doesn't just use your regular old Linux bootloader whether that's GRUB systemd boot refined anything else out there you might care about it uses its own custom bootloader this is called M1 N1 ignore the fact that it has M1 in its name it's for both the M1 M2 anything else that comes out in the future Pro Ultra Max Deluxe is Deluxe a real one I don't know it's the Bootloader for the Apple so silicon does your distro ship this in many cases it probably doesn't there's maybe like a handful of exceptions I know that Manjaro does but I can't think of really many others it's probably in the Aur as well but is it on Ubuntu is it on Fedora I don't know it probably isn't does it ship all of the other ushi Linux tooling as well is that tooling updated for your specific Hardware variant let's say we have the M1 and M2 support and then the M3 comes out and you go and buy one has your District updated the packages for the M3 support that's obviously going to change at least a bit is that support even worked on yet maybe maybe not is your distro installer set up to actually install onto these M1 and M2 systems does it have an option to use the m1n1 bootloader or do you have to go and manually set everything up yourself all of these questions and much more need to be answered before out of the box use is going to be available as for 16k kernels this refers to a page size of 16k now over on the Mac OS side it can use Dynamic page sizes if it needs a 4K page we need the 16k page it can just swap as it needs to on Linux it is either 4K Pages or 16k Pages what exactly a page is doesn't really matter for today's video the important thing is right now it needs to be a 16k kernel for the support that's available to be working in the future once 4K kernel builds are somewhat usable you can expect zero integration distros to somewhat work on these machines I.E some Hardware will work but not all or only partially this should be sufficient to add a third-party repo with the integration packages according to the US he Linux team no generic arm 64 distro ships 16k kernels today this might be wrong there might be one out there and I'm sure someone is going to leave it in the comment section down below now with all that being said it doesn't mean the mainline District support isn't going to be happening but for out of the box Hardware support distros will need to work with this to get everything right unlike Manjaro when they are shipped a kernel that I think that Colonel could break systems or destroy some Hardware if I'm not mistaken either way they tried shipping a kernel that was not ready to be shipped we are already working with some and we expect to announce official Apple silicon support for a mainstream distro in the near future just not quite yet I'm very curious what distro this is going to be and when it does happen no for a fact that I'm absolutely going to cover it now this part of the article wasn't mentioned in the tweets but it's by far my absolute favorite part fortunately Asahi Linux with brilliant software engineer Alyssa rosenweig was up to the challenge the challenge being getting Linux running on the Apple silicon but I know what this is implying it's implying that Alyssa is Lena now elicitors do really great work has done great work on things like Mesa has done great work getting involved in Asahi Linux but Alyssa is not leaner they are two separate people I don't know how people can be so wrong about this for so long they literally held a talk together at xdc 2022 they were talking at the same time they are not the same person I know there are some people out there who are really obsessed with who is the person behind the vtuber but Alyssa is not Lena they are not the same person stop now if it was just this one zedi net article that would be one thing but there are Outlets out there the treat this article and treats eating it generally as if they're doing first-hand reporting as if they know exactly what's going on like nine to five Mac the reported M1 Mac Linux 6.2 support for MacBook Air MacBook Pro Mac Studio Mac Mini and literally used ZDNet as a source at least they acknowledge that Alyssa is possibly a different person from Lena it was also reported by tech radar Linux kernel 6.2 is here and it now has Mainline support for Apple M1 chips good news for Apple enthusiasts no stop stop reporting what ZDNet reports as if it is always the truth do your own research don't just report what other outlets are reporting now I do want to give credit where credit is due because other outlets actually did report properly Mac world for example has a pretty tame article I still don't know why these articles need to exist nothing special happened with 6.2 there was an article also from Apple Insider which frames it in a you know a better way and also from Joey sneddon over at OMG Linux Linux now officially supports Apple silicon well kind of it's still you know kind of misleading but it's your normal click bait not just straight up lying about the state of the software and this is exactly why I typically list out my sources in the description if you think I'm wrong about something you think I'm lying about something if you think I'm making something up please just have a look at what I'm seeing and please correct me if I'm actually wrong if I'm not wrong and you're lying I'm gonna ban you so try me yeah uh let me know your thoughts in the comment section down below do you think it's really dumb that Outlets like this put out articles that are just complete nonsense making it seem like something way bigger is happening than it really is do you think it's not that big of a deal do you think everybody should just go and do their own research and it's just never a problem full stop let me know your thoughts down below and if you like the video go and like the video and if you really like the video and you want to become one of these amazing people over here go check out my patreon scrub Sully bear pay linked down below that's gonna be it for me and bye bye [Applause] [Music]