Santa Rosa Macbooks and Compiz
Hmm… it looks like the new Santa Rosa Macbooks are not idea for Ubuntu, as Compiz does not work well with them.
Some big differences from the previous C2D generation MacBook, as relates to Gutsy:
1. The Intel chipset has been upgraded to the "Santa Rosa" platform, the same as is currently in the Mac Book Pro. This is a good thing for several performance reasons, especially the faster (800mhz) front side bus and higher upper limit for RAM (4gB).
2. The new chipset replaces the "950" video with "X3100" video from Intel. While this is a more capable video chipset for things such as running 3D games in Windows, it does not currently work well with Compiz. The X3100 is actually blacklisted, and does not work with video. So if you want a smooth Compiz experience out of the box, you may have to wait for the next version of Ubuntu, or cough up the extra cash for a Mac Book Pro, which has discrete Nvidia graphics.
3. The WIFI chipset has changed from Atheros to the Broadcom 4328. This is a bad thing, in that Broadcom does not play nicely with Linux. To this point, I have not been able to get it working in 64-bit Ubuntu Studio. I have tried madwifi, ndiswrapper, and the bcm43xx firmware. The 4328 has been reported to work for some people in 32 bit mode.
4. The trackpad appears to have been updated, and does not respond to the synaptics driver settings in xorg.conf. While basic use is possible, I have not been able to add clicking and scrolling actions, or fine-tune the accuracy and speed. The GUI slider in the Mouse applet does work.
The physical keyboard layout has also changed, especially the multimedia and screen/volume controls. I have not yet been able to get the Ctrl+click to work as a right-click, which is a problem, since the trackpad doesn't seem to respond to xorg.conf customization
5. Sound doesn't work "out of the box" but I haven't tried too hard to get it working yet. Same goes for the iSight.
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