Trouble installing 18.04 on MacBookPro mid 2010 13"

Question

I tried to install Ubuntu 18.04 on the MBP as a standalone OS. The LiveSession runs fine, the installer gets 75% of the way and then a fatal error occurred. 2nd and 3rd attempts the same result.

Installed 16.04.5 from DVD with aim of upgrading straight to 18.04. Tried this via

sudo apt update && sudo apt dist-upgrade 

The upgrade seemed successful but when I restart I can login then presented with blank wallpaper, no icons nothing. Retried 3/4 times and always same result.

I have now settled on 16.04 install, I've solved the wifi drivers, the brightness control issues and installed Nvidia drivers for the 320m graphics card. All good, I feel at home in my new install and it does work.

Problem is that there are 23 updates outstanding but I am unsure whether to install them, I've read somewhere (during frantic googling to solve install issues above) that the newer kernel(s) is not compatible with Nvidia and that may be the root of the 18.04 problem (not sure). For that reason I don't know if I can install the updates. Can anyone advise?

What I would like to achieve is either: 1. An up to date, stable 16.04 install or 2. Stable 18.04 install via my existing 16.04

Is this possible? I am a dabbler in Linux so it is entirely probable that I am missing something obvious, feel free to point out in simple terms what I need to do!

Answer 1

If you update a kernel in Ubuntu it will keep the old kernel in case the new one fails, at which point you can hold down Shift while booting and select the old kernel in GRUB if needed. You can also manually downgrade the kernel later if needed.

It's also worth mentioning that Ubuntu 18.04 isn't the latest release. It's the latest Long Term Support (LTS) release, but because of that it may not get certain updates since it's designed to have kernel upates infrequently except for security issues. This means it's possible for an 18.10 installation to work better on your Macbook.