Hi! First of all, congratulations for this awesome OS!
I have a Mac Mini mid 2007 with hybrid architecture, a 32 bit firmware with 64 bit CPU. I installed a Debian 10 32 bits and it runs just fine! Problem is, 32 bits has been abandoned, products has been discontinued, soon there will be not much to run on it besides FireFox. So I am trying to install a 64 bit version...
Then the problems starts: this machine does not have an optical drive anymore, I changed it for more HDD storage. Only USB boot, and more compatibility issues. As long I decided to change again and work only with a SDD and to buy some used superdrive, this initiative can be useful to some situations when you just don't have an optical drive connected to the core. External ones won't boot, in fact, using USB ports will only boot Mac OS Lion, a special third part Mac OS Mojave, Windows 7 and Debian. And in the particular case of Debian, only through BIOS emulation mode, EFI refuses to run the installer.
My two attempts of installing the 64 version was...
- To build a hybrid bootable USB image by keeping the 32 bit boot but change the call for the 64 bit installer. Basically mixing 32 with 64 versions. But I could not make the image, don't have the tools for that.
- Converting the 32 bit version already installed into a 64 bit on-the-fly by, well, changing the files. I could make it boot in 64 bit! But it didn't go through the end and goes to command line. At some point I lost the partition and didn't try again, thought is too complicated.
So I'm asking for help on this. First, witch way is easier, thinking about left some legacy, and once decided the way, how can be done. Of course, if this is not the right place to ask, please point me the right direction.
My working machine now is a MacBook Pro 2012 running Mojave (Catalina does not work well). I have a Windows 10 in a partition and I am thing in installing some Linux too. I have Virtual Box but it is a bit slow, and you know, never perfect.
Thanks for hearing me!
Gustavo.