State of Linux on the MacBook Pro 2016 & 2017

The following document provides an overview about Linux support for Apple's MacBook Pro 2016 and MacBook Pro 2017 models.

The MacBook Pro 2016 shares surprisingly many components with the Retina MacBook (e.g. keyboard and touchpad controller, Wi-Fi and bluetooth chipsets, ...), so figuring out how things work on one device should benefit both device families.

The Apple MacBook Pro 2017 models are nearly identical to their 2016 counterparts, except for the use of newer Intels Kaby Lake processors instead of Intel Skylake processors, faster memory and updated AMD Radeon GPUs in the 15-inch models.

The checks if hardware works below were done with multiple Linux distributions. To state the obvious: The newer the kernel the better. If in doubt which kernel to use, the latest significant improvements are part of Linux 4.16.

If you don't know what the model identifier for your MacBook Pro is (as that identifier is used on several occasions below), check https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201300

Contribution

If you want to contribute to get Linux running smoothly on the MacBook Pro 2016, report all findings how to get devices working as pull requests! All help is appreciated.

Current status

Device	Status
Audio input & output
Battery
Bluetooth
FaceTime HD camera
Graphics card (Intel)
Graphics card (AMD)
Keyboard & Touchpad
NVMe (internal SSD)
Screen
Suspend & Hibernation
System Management Controller
Thunderbolt
Touch Bar
Touch ID
USB
Wi-Fi

Booting

To boot Linux version earlier than 4.10 properly, it's necessary to set intremap=nosid as kernel boot parameter. From 4.10 onwards that's not necessary anymore.

Audio input & output

Not working, neither the internal speakers/microphone nor the headphone jack.

What's working is audio via HDMI or any USB-connected audio device, so that can act as a workaround until internal audio is working.

See also:

Battery

Working fine, including the interface to get current capacity, temperature, etc.

Battery life is still suboptimal, because power saving modes for several devices, like display (panel self refresh), SSD or the Thunderbolt controllers, aren't working yet. You can expected a battery life of less than 4 hours.

Bluetooth

Works out of the box with Linux 4.16 and above, except for the models without Touch Bar, which still suffer from a bug and need an additional patch as noted in Dunedan#29 (comment)

For older kernel versions you need to compile a custom kernel with an additional patch set. For details check Dunedan#29

See also:

https://bugzilla.kernel.org/show_bug.cgi?id=110901

FaceTime HD camera

In the MacBookPro13,1 (without Touch Bar) the FaceTime HD camera is connected via PCIe, like in previous MacBook Pro's. It's working with the bcwc_pcie driver.

The models with Touch Bar have the FaceTime HD camera connected through the iBridge device via USB. They are exposed as regular USB video devices and are supported by the uvcvideo driver starting with Linux 4.13 out of the box. Previous Linux versions need the following quirk for uvcvideo to get them to work properly:

echo "options uvcvideo quirks=0x100" > /etc/modprobe.d/uvcvideo.conf

Graphics card

Intel

Graphical output using the Intel GPU is working out of the box on the MacBookPro 13,1 and 13,2, without dedicated AMD GPU. For the MacBookPro 13,3 with dedicated AMD GPU, only the AMD is enabled when booting a OS which isn't macOS, so you have to follow the instructions in the following link to enable the integrated Intel GPU, if you want to use it: Dunedan#6 (comment)

Connecting external displays via USB-C-to-DisplayPort cables works fine, including connections with daisy-chaining/MST. An actual tested and working setup includes concurrent output on the internal display and two external displays daisy-chained together with Full HD each.

AMD

Working since Linux 4.9.

See also:

Keyboard & Touchpad

Basic keyboard and touchpad functionality is working with the out-of-tree driver developed for the Retina Macbook (https://github.com/cb22/macbook12-spi-driver).

The Esc and function keys are part of the Touch Bar in all Touch Bar-models, so follow the instructions for the Touch Bar to get it working.

Beside the actual keyboard the power button and the lid close event work out of the box.

Palm rejection based on touch-sizes and disable-touchpad-while-typing are working with this patch to libinput (master branch).

See also:

NVMe

Works out of the box with Linux 4.11 and above.

The MacBookPro 13,1 or MacBookPro 13,2 on earlier versions of Linux need an out-of-tree patch (http://lists.infradead.org/pipermail/linux-nvme/2016-May/004618.html) or the following workaround:

modprobe nvme
echo 106b 2003 > /sys/bus/pci/drivers/nvme/new_id

The MacBookPro13,1, MacBookPro13,2, MacBookPro14,1 and MacBookPro14,2 occasionally can't properly initialize the NVMe controller after Linux took over from the boot manager, resulting in timeout messages and the inability to access the SSD and therefore the failure to boot. The only workaround known so far is to reboot until the problem isn't triggered.

The SSDs used in the MacBook Pros don't seem to support APST. As it's currently unknown how power saving works for those SSDs it's likely they consume way more power than they need to, therefore reducing the battery life.

See also:

Screen

Works out of the box.

Adjustable screen brightness only works out of the box for the models without additional AMD Radeon GPU (MacBookPro13,1 and MacBookPro13,2). For the MacBookPro13,3 with additional AMD Radeon GPU the following patch is necessary: https://bugzilla.kernel.org/show_bug.cgi?id=105051#c32

The only oddity noticed so far, is that the EDID data for the 13" model describes two modes: 2560x1600 and 2880x1800. Xorg probes and sets the correct resolution of 2560x1600. For a detailed look into the EDID data, check out macbook13,2/card0-eDP-1.edid.

Suspend & Hibernation

Putting the MacBook Pro into suspend mode works, but it doesn't wake up again. @roadrunner2 did some work in this area. You'll find some details about it in cb22/macbook12-spi-driver#30 (comment)

System Management Controller

The System Management Controller is responsible for interactions with sensors, fans.

Fans, temperature and voltage sensors work out of the box using the applesmc kernel module, while the ambient light sensors only work in the MacBookPro13,1.

An accelerometer doesn't seem to be available at all.

Thunderbolt

Works out of the box with Linux 4.13 and above.

Tested on a MacBookPro13,3 with a HP Thunderbolt 3 Dock. DisplayPort with a 4k Display with 60 Hz works via the dock. The (PCI) Ethernet inside the dock and USB/audio from the dock work too.

Touch Bar

Not working out of the box, but thanks to @roadrunner2 basic functionality is working using the driver you can find at: https://github.com/roadrunner2/macbook12-spi-driver/blob/touchbar-driver-hid-driver/appletb.c

Missing is as of now just the advanced functionality with custom graphics Apple offers in macOS.

Touch ID

Not working.

USB

Works out of the box.

Wi-Fi

The MacBook Pro models without Touch Bar come with a Broadcom Limited BCM4350 802.11ac Wireless Network Adapter which works fine out of the box using the brcmfmac driver (ensure you got the matching firmware package installed).

The MacBook Pro models with Touch Bar come with a Broadcom Limited BCM43602 802.11ac Wireless LAN SoC (rev 02) which is also supported by brcmfmac, but has several issues rendering it unusable, caused by the available firmware. The issues are caused by failing country detection and are:

Only 2.4Ghz APs are shown
Connecting to an AP barely works or fails directly

According to Broadcom releasing a fixed firmware would require verification to ensure that it complies with regulartory limits, which is very unlikely to happen as it wouldn't provide enough return on investment for them (see https://bugzilla.kernel.org/show_bug.cgi?id=193121 for details).

Misc

History of improvements per kernel version

4.9

Working AMD graphics of the MacBookPro13,3 (which is the only model with both Intel and AMD graphics).

4.10

intremap=nosid as kernel boot parameter not necessary anymore, although it's unclear why.

4.11

The NVMe controller in the MacBookPro13,1 and MacBookPro13,2 is now working out of the box (the one in the MacBookPro13,3 was already working before). (linux/commit/124298b)
When booting with kernel modesetting (KMS) the screen isn't scrambled during boot anymore.

4.13

On the Touch Bar models the FaceTime HD camera is working out of the box. (linux/commit/7b848ed)
Adds support for the Alpine Ridge 4C Thunderbolt Chip used in the MacBook Pro's (linux/commit/5e2781b)

4.14

Includes the foundation for upstreaming the applespi-driver. (linux/commit/ca9ef3a, linux/commit/899596e, linux/commit/75fc70e, linux/commit/630b3af)

4.16

Bluetooth is now working out of the box. (linux/commit/8353b4a, linux/commit/8bfa7e1, linux/commit/4c33162)

iBridge

The models with Touch Bar feature an additional USB device, called iBridge (Bus 001 Device 002: ID 05ac:8600 Apple, Inc.). It's the interface to the embedded T1-chip running iOS and providing access to the FaceTime HD camera, the Touch Bar and Touch ID.

A prerequisite for all devices connected to the iBridge to work is a firmware stored by macOS on the EFI system partition (ESP). For the time being the easiest way to keep this firmware available is to install Linux in addition to macOS and keeping the contents of the original ESP in place.

If the iBridge couldn't be initialized (e.g. because the firmware is missing), instead of the usual USB device, the following USB device is present: Apple Mobile Device [Recovery Mode] (Bus 001 Device 003: ID 05ac:1281 Apple, Inc.)

usb-devices shows that iBridge exposes four interfaces:

T:  Bus=01 Lev=01 Prnt=01 Port=02 Cnt=01 Dev#=  4 Spd=480 MxCh= 0
D:  Ver= 2.00 Cls=ef(misc ) Sub=02 Prot=01 MxPS=64 #Cfgs=  3
P:  Vendor=05ac ProdID=8600 Rev=01.01
S:  Manufacturer=Apple Inc.
S:  Product=iBridge
S:  SerialNumber=nomac?123456
C:  #Ifs= 4 Cfg#= 1 Atr=e0 MxPwr=0mA
I:  If#= 0 Alt= 0 #EPs= 0 Cls=0e(video) Sub=01 Prot=00 Driver=(none)
I:  If#= 1 Alt= 0 #EPs= 1 Cls=0e(video) Sub=02 Prot=00 Driver=(none)
I:  If#= 2 Alt= 0 #EPs= 1 Cls=03(HID  ) Sub=01 Prot=01 Driver=usbhid
I:  If#= 3 Alt= 0 #EPs= 1 Cls=03(HID  ) Sub=00 Prot=01 Driver=usbhid

The two video interfaces could be the FaceTime HD camera and the Touch Bar, while the two HID interfaces could be the Touch Bar and the Touch ID button.

Booting macOS as a VM interestingly leads to the following changed output of usb-devices:

T:  Bus=01 Lev=01 Prnt=01 Port=02 Cnt=01 Dev#=  2 Spd=480 MxCh= 0
D:  Ver= 2.00 Cls=ef(misc ) Sub=02 Prot=01 MxPS=64 #Cfgs=  3
P:  Vendor=05ac ProdID=8600 Rev=01.01
S:  Manufacturer=Apple Inc.
S:  Product=iBridge
S:  SerialNumber=nomac?123456
C:  #Ifs= 8 Cfg#= 2 Atr=e0 MxPwr=0mA
I:  If#= 0 Alt= 0 #EPs= 0 Cls=0e(video) Sub=01 Prot=00 Driver=uvcvideo
I:  If#= 1 Alt= 0 #EPs= 1 Cls=0e(video) Sub=02 Prot=00 Driver=(none)
I:  If#= 2 Alt= 0 #EPs= 1 Cls=03(HID  ) Sub=00 Prot=01 Driver=usbhid
I:  If#= 3 Alt= 0 #EPs= 2 Cls=10() Sub=00 Prot=00 Driver=(none)
I:  If#= 4 Alt= 0 #EPs= 0 Cls=02(commc) Sub=0d Prot=00 Driver=(none)
I:  If#= 5 Alt= 0 #EPs= 0 Cls=0a(data ) Sub=00 Prot=01 Driver=(none)
I:  If#= 6 Alt= 0 #EPs= 1 Cls=03(HID  ) Sub=00 Prot=01 Driver=usbhid
I:  If#= 7 Alt= 0 #EPs= 2 Cls=ff(vend.) Sub=f9 Prot=11 Driver=(none)

Seems like macOS somehow initalizes some additional capabilities of the iBridge.

Disable auto-boot

Apple introduced an "auto-boot" feature with the MacBook Pro 2016 causing the notebook to be switched on, whenever the screen lid is opened. By modifying a NVRAM variable this can be (luckily) disabled again.

How to do that from macOS as well as enabling the startup chime again is documented e.g. at http://www.idownloadblog.com/2016/10/31/how-to-stop-the-new-macbook-pro-from-automatically-turning-on-when-the-lid-is-open/

To disable auto boot from within Linux, ensure that efivarfs is mounted and run:

printf "\x07\x00\x00\x00\x00" > /sys/firmware/efi/efivars/AutoBoot-7c436110-ab2a-4bbb-a880-fe41995c9f82

If you get "No space left on device" errors, it's probably because of dump-type0-*-variables written by the Linux kernel taking up all space. Removing them solves the problem:

for i in $(find /sys/firmware/efi/efivars/ -name 'dump-type0*'); do chattr -i $i; rm $i; done

With disabled auto boot the MacBook Pro will show the battery percentage for a brief second as an image on the screen whenever you open the lid or plug in the power cord while the lid is open.

To reenable auto boot again run:

chattr -i /sys/firmware/efi/efivars/AutoBoot-7c436110-ab2a-4bbb-a880-fe41995c9f82
rm /sys/firmware/efi/efivars/AutoBoot-7c436110-ab2a-4bbb-a880-fe41995c9f82

aunali1 / mbp-2016-linux

State of Linux on the MacBook Pro 2016 & 2017

Contribution

Current status

Booting

Audio input & output

Battery

Bluetooth

FaceTime HD camera

Graphics card

Intel

AMD

Keyboard & Touchpad

NVMe

Screen

Suspend & Hibernation

System Management Controller

Thunderbolt

Touch Bar

Touch ID

USB

Wi-Fi

Misc

History of improvements per kernel version

4.9

4.10

4.11

4.13

4.14

4.16

iBridge

Disable auto-boot

Links

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