Happy Birthday MacBook

Yes, as crazy as it may seem, I have a birthday reminder for my MacBook! On the 4th of September, it celebrated its 10th birthday. That's quite something when you consider that Apple is a specialist in planned obsolescence. Proof of this is that the latest officially compatible OS for my Macbook 8,1 is Mac OS Big Sur, support for which ended in September 2023.

But this machine is still operational. Absolutely everything works! I have had its battery replaced regularly, and even though a few keys on the keyboard are stubborn due to poor design, my little Macbook is my tireless travel companion. So it deserves longer support, and thanks to the Open Core Legacy Patcher project, I am running MacOS 14.7.8.

Apple will be an eco-responsible company the day it allows its customers to easily maintain and repair their machines. Causing the end-of-life of devices by no longer maintaining the software that gives them life is, in fact, planned obsolescence. And if Apple's decision-makers believe they shouldn't maintain drivers after a certain time, no one is stopping them from publishing Linux drivers or at least open-source drivers for so-called obsolete machines...

I know, days of my MacBook are numbered. I won't be making the leap to Apple's latest operating systems. Avoiding anything remotely related to Apple Intelligence features, I completely lost confidence in their operating systems since version 15, Sequoia. So, when version 14 is no longer supported, by September 2026, I will have the choice between:

• trying to install Linux on it, but to date I haven't found anything to help me get the keyboard, trackpad, and sound to work properly...
• or no longer using the machine and keeping it as a souvenir

In the meantime, my Macbook will continue to be my companion for at least another eleventh year for everything that doesn't require a graphics card, and however underpowered it may be, it efficiently performs all the usual tasks, completely fanless, please <3