Fedora16 on a mac.

[symbolix]

Hi,
I have been reading about this issue on these forums for almost more than 10 hours. And I could not find a solution to my problem. There are bits and pieces but it is very hard to piece them together.

Aim:
I am trying to have a triple boot: OSX, XP and Fedora16 on an iMac (Early 2009)

Problems:
1) Installation from a Fedora16 DVD fails to start: This has been sorted by applying the "nomodeset xdriver=vesa" solution. Please search for this on these forums.

2) Fedora16 will not boot after a successful installation. This is really where it gets complicated and nasty. It is something related to: "hybrid mbr?", "boot flags?", "GPT partitions?" it is something to do with the partitioning etc. There are many things explained but all are just very complicated and scattered across multiple post.

Could you please help me with this? Is there on single workflow that solves this "booting" problem. Ubuntu 10.04 will install and run with OSX and XP with no problems at all.

But I really would like to try and have Fedora running,
Thanks,

[symbolix]

I think I will just give up Fedora. I have heard good things about it and we use it at work but it is just such a pain to install on a mac. And the workarounds explained are so complicated and confusing. At the end, I kept hitting that "GPT Partition" wall or what ever it is, the incompatible boot thing?! Where you can not boot Fedora but the install completes fine. The problem that is supposed to be fixed with some "gdisk" tool of some kind that I never managed to install with yum under a rescue session etc. So it is a dead-end for me. I know user chrismurphy has been successful solving these issues... but I simply do not have any more time to invest in this.

Sorry. Will go back to Ubuntu.

[popzie]

I don't mean to sound insulting but why would you want linux and mac on the same system. I think you would be better satisfied to leave mac to mac, find a cheep laptop or buy another hard drive to install fedora on. I have used SUSE Red Hat up through v10 I switch to mint I tried fedora v12 went back to mint, but i never tried loading them on the same drive. I am now back with Fedora 16 and find it is awesome I think I will stay with this one for some time.The only thing I find a little annoying is if I disable my wifi to work off line I have to reboot to start it again. I don't think you will find a better free Linux system than Fedora 16

[PompeyBlue]

The reason why I, personally, have Win / Mac & Linux on my Macbook air is because it means I only need 1 laptop to be able to do any sort of software development that I need to.

Web / server development / Android - I boot into Linux
iOS (iPhone/iPad ec) - I boot into Mac
C# / XNA / C++ / DirectX - I boot into Win

All from one handy laptop. I used to lug two laptops around with me all of the time but now I only have 1 Macbook Air and I can still develop any sort of software that I can ever imagine.

I remember when it was all ModeX & C, how things change....

[popzie]

pompeyBlu, sorry i didn't realize u were a developer I can now understand why u would wan't all three OS's on the same laptop. When I was younger i can remember when I would have wanted the same thing. I was a programmer for bldg automation. I have been retired since 2001. I check different OS's for my own use now and it is nice to find one like Fedora that just works. I now don't have the time to write script, I just want things that work. I personally don't think u can a better free linux system than Fedora 16. Lots of luck in ur development good ones that R dedicated R hard to find.

[sesso]

I am also interested in getting fedora onto my mac. I am just nervous about breaking the OS. I have created a backup so I could try lol.

I already have win and OSX installed. I am thinking I can install linux and sync the tables.

[flyingfsck]

FWIIW, I fixed a F16 won't boot issue on a Lenovo Thinkpad by ticking the little box for 'Force /boot to be a primary partition'. I have no idea whether it will work for an iMac.

[sesso]

On macs it seems to be broken. refit needs to update their software for new mac users. I had to use the recovery partition and do a disk repair to fix the GPT table.