How to solve wi-fi problem on Macbook Air mid 2013? (programming.dev)

submitted 1 day ago by muhyb@programming.dev to c/linux@programming.dev

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cross-posted from: https://programming.dev/post/38558693

We have a Macbook Air mid 2013 and no matter what distro I tried, making wi-fi work was pain due to Broadcom drivers and not having ethernet port. Basically had to install the drivers via phone tethering.

However, probably because of the drivers, there are certain problems like disconnecting out of blue or really slow connection or cannot reconnect unless reboot the PC.

So I want to ask, if you have this Macbook and have Linux installed, which distro you're using it with? How is it?

Recently I installed Bazzite on a home computer and printers, Xbox controller, iPhone connection, everything the owners need worked out of the box. I'm wondering, would it also work fine with this Macbook too?

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[-] Moss_the_TeXie@rheinneckar.social 2 points 8 hours ago

@muhyb
I have a MacBook Pro 13" late-2013 running Cinnamon (Mint based I think) and I had to install some arcane binary driver package to enable WLAN. Can’t remember now which chipset and which driver but I’ll recherche and get back to you. Please ping me if there’s no answer this week.

Mint Cinnamon still isn’t the OS of choice as it confuses sleep levels on this machine.

[-] muhyb@programming.dev 1 points 7 hours ago

Thanks for the reply! Currently it seems to be fixed with blacklisting but we'll see if there will be any issues. Someone else mentioned that Mint can install required drivers on its drivers program (by connecting the Macbook via phone tethering).

Could you perhaps check which adapter your Macbook has? The one we have has BCM4360.

[-] oshu@lemmy.world 2 points 23 hours ago

I have a 2013 i7 Macbook Air and everything "just works" with the latest Linux Mint Debian Edition, including wifi and both usb ethernet and thunderbolt ethernet.

[-] muhyb@programming.dev 1 points 9 hours ago

Is your wi-fi adapter also BCM4360? That's the one this Macbook has and no distro recognized it including Mint. Though this Macbook has i5, maybe they're kinda different?

[-] reseller_pledge609@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 21 hours ago

I want to preface this by saying I've never owned or used a Macbook.

But most of what I've read online regarding Linux on Macbooks ends up with Linux Mint. And most of the time, peoeple specifically mention it because of Wi-Fi issues being resolved.

I'm not sure if there's any additional steps or anything, but I hope this can somehow be useful to you.

[-] muhyb@programming.dev 1 points 10 hours ago

Yeah, I noticed that too. Though the reason I haven't installed it was that I already installed specifically a immutable distro because of the person who will use it. However I also tried Mint as a live ISO to see if that has the driver pre-installed, it didn't. Later I thought, if this is the same proprietary driver, distro choice won't matter. Then I found about blacklisting.

this post was submitted on 04 Oct 2025

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