Contrary to what some reports have pointed out, Linux 6.2 still does not run on Apple’s hardware, namely, with the company’s M chips that have been the flagship of Apple’s latest devices. Upstream support for M1 chips is present in this kernel and will gradually come to Ubuntu and Fedora, but the system developers are asking everyone to please wait a bit.
Naturally, there have been advances, with improvements starting from work on Apple’s integrated GPU by the four-person core team of the Asahi Linux porting project. Still, the project’s official Twitter page has gone public to respond to enthusiasts.
There is an ongoing news cycle regarding Linux 6.2 being the first kernel to support the M1, started by @ZDNET. 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.
— Asahi Linux (@[email protected]) (@AsahiLinux) February 26, 2023
“You will not be able to run Ubuntu or any other standard distro with 6.2 on any M1 Mac. Please don’t get your hopes up,” they tweeted on Sunday. “We are continually updating kernel features and 6.2 notably adds device trees and basic boot support for M1 Pro/Max/Ultra machines. However, there is still a long way to go before the upstream kernels are usable on laptops. No trackpad/keyboard support yet.”
On some Apple devices, there are still problems with microphones, webcams, speakers, HDMI output and other details.
The development documents show a wide range of impressive achievements, considering how the team typically reverse-engineers everything from Apple’s new system-on-a-chip to its legacy ARM components. And yet, as the team at Asahi points out, it’s not ready for all of Apple’s M-series devices, nor for standard distributions. The main hurdle for other distributions, according to the team, is the 16kB page size that must be built into a kernel for it to run.
