Arch Linux

X75TIGER75X

Member

Registered: 2014-07-19

Posts: 8

Arch Linux on Macbook Air 2014

Hi everyone,

I'm having trouble with installing Arch Linux on my new Macbook Air 2014. I have installed Arch Linux on several other devices before, but this is my first time playing around with Mac's EFI bootloadIoader.

I installed and used rEFInd to boot live-cd .iso on my USB. I have done some research beforehand and followed the instructions on Arch Linux Macbook installation page. I was fine until I arrived at the bootloader installation part. I struggled with it for hours. I tried this tutorial https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Ma … nd_booting and installed grub and efibootmgr. There are several problems like arch failed to mount efivarfs because it is already mounted. I tried rEFInd bootloader process. I've had no luck with it. 

I looked over the internet and there are so many different methods to install Arch Linux. I am not sure where to start. There are many articles about installing Arch Linux on macbook air 2013 but very few about 2014 version. Because of this, I am uncertain which methods is correct for 2014 version. Is there a somebody on this forum who has successfully installed Arch Linux on MBA 2014 who would like to share how he/she installed the bootloader?

Thanks in advance.

EDIT: I forgot to mention that I want Arch Linux only installation on my laptop.

Last edited by X75TIGER75X (2014-07-19 02:54:56)

Spider.007

Member

Registered: 2004-06-20

Posts: 1,175

Re: Arch Linux on Macbook Air 2014

I've installed on several macs without issues; I acttually found refit to be redundant. After installing grub and creating a Standalone grub app; when restarting the mac; keep the left-alt key down (this gets you to the macs own bootloader). It should show your efi-ball which should boot fine. I have described the steps I took in https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/IMac_Fusion

Last edited by Spider.007 (2014-07-19 10:25:47)

X75TIGER75X

Member

Registered: 2014-07-19

Posts: 8

Re: Arch Linux on Macbook Air 2014

I've had no luck with grub. I tried installing grub and that the Mac boot loader where you hold down ALT, only detects Arch Linux live CD on my USB drive. I don't know where I did wrong. Can anyone give me some suggestions on how to get Mac boot loader to detect my Arch Linux installation?

To be honest, I'm a noob at understanding how bootloaders work. Where is the best place for me to read and study EFI bootloader and GRUB bootloader in the depth?

Spider.007

Member

Registered: 2004-06-20

Posts: 1,175

Re: Arch Linux on Macbook Air 2014

How did you install grub; did you create a standalone-app like I suggested? Reading can be done on the Wiki I pointed to.

Fixed

Member

Registered: 2005-08-09

Posts: 212

Re: Arch Linux on Macbook Air 2014

@X75TIGER75X --

I just installed Arch on MBA2014 as per http://dabase.com/blog/Macbook_Air_Earl … Archlinux/ instructions.

It took about 3 hours, but now I'm in the shell mode.  Still need to install graphical environment and Wi-Fi - but that's more or less known issues.

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XFCE4 under Arch on Honor MagicBook

Fixed

Member

Registered: 2005-08-09

Posts: 212

Re: Arch Linux on Macbook Air 2014

Did  anyone have any luck with Xorg activation on MBA2014? 

I tried many drivers including nouveau, mesa and intel, but still no screens found in diagnostics. Can anyone post relevant file from /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d ?

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XFCE4 under Arch on Honor MagicBook