I can install Ubuntu 12.04 on the MacBook when using the "noapic" kernel boot option, using the alternate amd64+mac image (from http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/releases/12.04/release/ ).
But after installation the screen turn sblack after trying to boot "Windows" (as named in the boot menu that shows up when holding Option/Alt during startup).
I want to use whole-disk encryption and given that only one free partition is available, I have setup LVM to do so:
– vg0 contains bootlv and cryptlv
– in cryptlv I have setup encryption with another LVM volume group (vg1, which holds swaplv, rootlv and homelv)
I have not installed Grub during installation (because I was not sure about the partition) and when trying to install it later on /dev/sda4 (which contains the outer LVM) it complained that it could not determine the file system, and --force
did not help either.
The black screen / behavior looks similar to starting the installer without enabling the noapic
option.
Best Answer
My question appears to have been answered in the Ubuntu bug report at: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/grub2/+bug/1027951/comments/17
Somehow I was under the impression that I need to limit the GPT partitions to 4, so that syncing the GPT works. But apparently this syncing is discouraged and not required when using Grub 2.