Manjaro does not wake up after sleep--old MacBookPro

Hello everyone,

I have an old MacBOokPro back from 2009. I decided to install with Manjaro XFCE plus a few small applications; nothing major.

The comp has been working working all right apart from being slow. However, I usually had a problem with getting it into sleep and waking up. if I forgot and let it go standby, I’d have to turn it off and on again.

However, since last time it doesn’t start at all. After booting, the screen remains black. I thought the comp broke but it responds to boot from other media; macs after booting plays a sound which I can hear, so the I take the comp is still working. I could run LiveCD with Manjaro if I had to.

It feels the system got stuck on waking up and cannot pass this stage. Do think there is something I can do to force it shut down and turn on again?

Thanks

As with all macs we need the exact model identifier, eg ‘macbook pro 5,4’. If you don’t know it please boot a live media and post the output of:
inxi -Fz

Thanks. Below is what the command has given me (after cutting out additional stuff):

Machine:
  Type: Laptop System: Apple product: MacBookPro5,3 v: 1.0
CPU:
  Info: dual core model: Intel Core2 Duo T9600 bits: 64 type: MCP cache:
    L2: 6 MiB
  Speed (MHz): avg: 1596 min/max: 1596/2793 cores: 1: 1596 2: 1596
Drives:
  Local Storage: total: 473.26 GiB used: 0 KiB (0.0%)
  ID-1: /dev/sda vendor: Seagate model: ST9500420ASG size: 465.76 GiB
  ID-2: /dev/sdb type: USB vendor: Corsair model: Flash Voyager
    size: 7.5 GiB

Not playing hide and seek here, I’m out.

Make yours look like this and it will fly:

Summary
Kernel: 5.10.147-1-MANJARO arch: x86_64 bits: 64 Desktop: MATE v: 1.26.0
    Distro: Manjaro Linux
Machine:
  Type: Laptop System: Apple product: MacBookPro5,4 v: 1.0
    serial: <superuser required>
  Mobo: Apple model: Mac-F22587A1 v: MacBookPro5,4
    serial: <superuser required> UEFI: Apple v: MBP53.88Z.00AC.B03.0906151647
    date: 06/15/09
Battery:
  ID-1: BAT0 charge: 78.1 Wh (99.9%) condition: 78.2/77.8 Wh (100.6%)
CPU:
  Info: dual core model: Intel Core2 Duo P8700 bits: 64 type: MCP cache:
    L2: 3 MiB
  Speed (MHz): avg: 1337 min/max: 798/2527 cores: 1: 1805 2: 869
Graphics:
  Device-1: NVIDIA C79 [GeForce 9400M] driver: nvidia v: 340.108
  Device-2: Apple Built-in iSight type: USB driver: uvcvideo
  Display: x11 server: X.Org v: 21.1.4 with: Xwayland v: 22.1.3 driver: X:
    loaded: nvidia gpu: nvidia resolution: 1440x900~60Hz
  Message: Unable to show GL data. Required tool glxinfo missing.
Audio:
  Device-1: NVIDIA MCP79 High Definition Audio driver: snd_hda_intel
  Sound API: ALSA v: k5.10.147-1-MANJARO running: yes
  Sound Server-1: PipeWire v: 0.3.58 running: yes
Network:
  Device-1: NVIDIA MCP79 Ethernet driver: forcedeth
  IF: enp0s10 state: down mac: <filter>
  Device-2: Broadcom BCM4322 802.11a/b/g/n Wireless LAN driver: wl
  IF: wlp4s0 state: up mac: <filter>
Bluetooth:
  Device-1: Apple Bluetooth Host Controller type: USB driver: btusb
  Report: bt-adapter ID: hci0 state: up address: <filter>
Drives:
  Local Storage: total: 111.79 GiB used: 40.21 GiB (36.0%)
  ID-1: /dev/sda vendor: Crucial model: CT120M500SSD3 size: 111.79 GiB
Partition:
  ID-1: / size: 85.87 GiB used: 40.21 GiB (46.8%) fs: ext4 dev: /dev/sda3
  ID-2: /boot/efi size: 511 MiB used: 3.7 MiB (0.7%) fs: vfat
    dev: /dev/sda1
Swap:
  ID-1: swap-1 type: partition size: 3.95 GiB used: 0 KiB (0.0%)
    dev: /dev/sda5
Sensors:
  System Temperatures: cpu: 65.0 C mobo: N/A gpu: nvidia temp: 69 C
  Fan Speeds (RPM): N/A
Info:
  Processes: 165 Uptime: 32m Memory: 3.59 GiB used: 1.28 GiB (35.6%)
  Shell: Zsh inxi: 3.3.22

Here’s the full log. Thanks.

Summary
System:
  Kernel: 5.15.60-1-MANJARO arch: x86_64 bits: 64 Desktop: Xfce v: 4.16.0
    Distro: Manjaro Linux
Machine:
  Type: Laptop System: Apple product: MacBookPro5,3 v: 1.0 serial: <filter>
  Mobo: Apple model: Mac-F22587C8 serial: N/A UEFI: Apple
    v: MBP53.88Z.00AC.B03.0906151647 date: 06/15/09
Battery:
  ID-1: BAT0 charge: 41.7 Wh (98.1%) condition: 42.5/70.9 Wh (60.0%)
CPU:
  Info: dual core model: Intel Core2 Duo T9600 bits: 64 type: MCP cache:
    L2: 6 MiB
  Speed (MHz): avg: 2128 min/max: 1596/2793 cores: 1: 1596 2: 2660
Graphics:
  Device-1: NVIDIA G96CM [GeForce 9600M GT] driver: nouveau v: kernel
  Device-2: NVIDIA C79 [GeForce 9400M] driver: nouveau v: kernel
  Device-3: Apple Built-in iSight type: USB driver: uvcvideo
  Display: x11 server: X.Org v: 21.1.4 driver: X: loaded: modesetting
    gpu: nouveau resolution: 1: 1440x900~60Hz 2: N/A
  Message: Unable to show GL data. Required tool glxinfo missing.
Audio:
  Device-1: NVIDIA MCP79 High Definition Audio driver: snd_hda_intel
  Sound Server-1: ALSA v: k5.15.60-1-MANJARO running: yes
  Sound Server-2: PulseAudio v: 16.1 running: yes
  Sound Server-3: PipeWire v: 0.3.56 running: yes
Network:
  Device-1: NVIDIA MCP79 Ethernet driver: forcedeth
  IF: enp0s10 state: down mac: <filter>
  Device-2: Broadcom BCM4322 802.11a/b/g/n Wireless LAN
    driver: b43-pci-bridge
  IF-ID-1: wlan0 state: up mac: <filter>
Drives:
  Local Storage: total: 473.26 GiB used: 0 KiB (0.0%)
  ID-1: /dev/sda vendor: Seagate model: ST9500420ASG size: 465.76 GiB
  ID-2: /dev/sdb type: USB vendor: Corsair model: Flash Voyager
    size: 7.5 GiB
Partition:
  Message: No partition data found.
Swap:
  Alert: No swap data was found.
Sensors:
  System Temperatures: cpu: 58.0 C mobo: N/A
  Fan Speeds (RPM): N/A
  GPU: device: nouveau temp: 59.0 C device: nouveau temp: 58.0 C
Info:
  Processes: 186 Uptime: 17m Memory: 3.58 GiB used: 2.1 GiB (58.8%)
  Shell: Bash inxi: 3.3.20

Ok, that’s better. It’s a higher-specd model with 2 nvidia cards; I guess you switch via a MacOS utility similar to KDE Plasma not starting after installing Nvidia non-free driver on 2012 MacBook Pro - #15 by 6x12 . However, in 2022 they are both lame but at least they share both open source and proprietary driver.
The advantage of the GeForce 9600M GT would be that the dedicated 256MB video ram would give you your full 4GB ram whereas your GeForce 9400M pinches it’s ram from the 4GB system ram. Since we’re both on 3.58 GiB ram, we both have GeForce 9400M running and are therefore on (almost) identical machines.

To make this a usable machine I’d open it, remove the 14 years old spinner drive (which most likely is the reason for your ‘things are getting worse’ issues) and either clone it to an ssd or put a blank ssd in and reinstall xfce. While you have it open you could swap the ram to 2x4GB (27€, G.Skill SO-DIMM 8 GB DDR3-1066 Kit, Arbeitsspeicher F3-8500CL7D-8GBSQ, Lite Retail ).

Swapping the drive will take 15- 20 min, it’s super easy (How to Upgrade a 15-inch MacBook Pro (Mid 2009) Hard Drive/SSD - YouTube). This is by far the most important step to make the machine usable in 2022, just checked, mine boots in 20 sec to desktop, with my old spinner it’s more like 2min.

Second probable reason for the wakeup issues is the nouveau driver. While it usually works ok it’s a little more erratic and needs all eye candy turned down. In Control Centre >> Windows Manager Tweaks >> Compositor set transparencies to ‘opaque’ and remove as many ticks as possible. Also install 5.4LTS and 5.10LTS and try both, at times a kernel update will cause issues and you’ll have to try the other kernel or avoid suspend altogether.

If you got this far you can install the nvidia-340xx-dkms driver, Instructions are here in the forum, but I seriously wouldn’t try this unless you got a usable machine with the steps above.

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This is great. Thanks for the clues. I am really happy I don’t need to dispose it :stuck_out_tongue: Everything is in good condition and its screen is still way better than a couple of other laptops I worked on. Cheers!

Glad you found the info helpful.

Just to clarify, I made it sound like the dedicated graphics 9600GT would be my preferred choice because of the 256MB more system ram; it isn’t.

In 2009 those machines were running at 10-20% of their power when used on ‘light’ tasks like browsing, using office software etc. In 2022 that’s more like 40-60% because of higher resolution net content, larger software etc. On top of that heat paste performance has degraded over time, so the less power consumption the better and I guess 9600GT will probably take at least 15Watt more than 9400M, so I would leave the 9400M in charge and max out the ram instead.

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