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Distro for 2012 MacBook Pro Retina (15 inch)
(lemmy.dbzer0.com)
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this post was submitted on 16 May 2026
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Linux
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Linux is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991 by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged in a Linux distribution (or distro for short).
Distributions include the Linux kernel and supporting system software and libraries, many of which are provided by the GNU Project. Many Linux distributions use the word "Linux" in their name, but the Free Software Foundation uses the name GNU/Linux to emphasize the importance of GNU software, causing some controversy.
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I have a 2015 with R9 M370X, tried Ubuntu and Arch. The latter worked better out of the box (wi-fi, bluetooth, trackpad, etc. minus webcam) for me so that's what I'd recommend (with archinstall).
You should be able to use gpu-switch to enable or disable discrete graphics: https://github.com/0xbb/gpu-switch
In the end I gave up on trying to run Linux on my specific MacBook. With amdgpu, it would seemingly run fine. Watching videos on Youtube, even with H264ify, the temps would slowly creep up over 90c. I had to bump up the fans quite high with mbpfan. However, the biggest problem was that it would randomly lock up after 20-30 mins of continuous general use.
With Intel Iris graphics, even general browsing with firefox was too annoying for me. Even continuously scrolling basic webpages would raise my CPU temps to around 90c with the fans blasting. It ran fine otherwise, no kernel panics or anything. Just too noisy and hot for my liking.
Thanks, that's interesting! I might have to go back to MacOS...