Arch Linux Installation Tutorial

Linux Installations

(Works with Arch ISO Image build as of: 2024.02.01)

Arch Linux with BSPWM Window Manager Installation Guide (UEFI & MBR)

Table of Contents

Load Keymaps (for non US ENG Keyboard Users only)

For a list of all the available keymaps, use the command:

localectl list-keymaps

To search for a keymap, use the following command, replacing [search_term] with the code for your language, country, or layout:

localectl list-keymaps | grep -i [search_term]

Now Loadkeys

loadkeys [keymap]

Check for Internet Connectivity

ping -c 4 google.com
  • If you are connected through Ethernet, then your Internet will be working out of the box.
  • If you are using Wi-Fi, then use wifi-menu to connect to your local network.
  • If this step is successful then we will head to next one.

Update system clock

timedatectl set-ntp true

Preparing the Disk for System

:warning: Be extremely careful when managing your disks, incase you delete your precious data then DON’T blame me.Disk partitioning type (use UEFI or MBR, go according to your system).

For UEFI System

Disk Partitioning (UEFI)

We are going to make two partitions on our HDD, EFI BOOT & ROOT using gdisk.

  • If you have a brand new HDD or if no partition table is found, then create GPT Partition Table by pressing g.
gdisk /dev/[disk name]
  • [disk name] = device to partition, find yours by running lsblk.
  • We will be using one partition for our /, /boot & /home.
n = New Partition
simply press enter = 1st Partition
simply press enter = As First Sector
+512M = As Last sector (BOOT Partition Size)
ef00 = EFI Partition Type

n = New Partition again
simply press enter = 2nd Partition
simply press enter = As First Sector
simply press enter = As Last sector [ROOT Partition Size (using the remaining disk space left)]
8300 or simply press enter = EXT4 ROOT Partition Type

w = write & exit

Format Partitions (UEFI)

mkfs.fat -F32 /dev/[efi partition name]
mkfs.ext4 /dev/[root partiton name]

Mount Partitions (UEFI)

mount /dev/[root partition name] /mnt
mkdir /mnt/boot/efi
mount /dev/[efi partition name] /mnt/boot/efi

For MBR System

Disk Partitioning (MBR)

We are going to make two partitions on our HDD, SWAP & ROOT using cfdisk.

  • If you have a brand new HDD or if no partition table is found, then create MSDos Partition Table by selecting msdos.
cfdisk /dev/[disk name]
  • [disk name] = device to partition, find yours by running lsblk.
  • SWAP Partition should double the size of RAM available in your system. Not applicable on 16GB or more RAM.
  • We will be using one partition for our /, /boot & /home.

Format the Partition, Make SWAP & Mount ROOT (MBR)

Format ROOT Partition as EXT4

mkfs.ext4 /dev/[root partition name]

Make & Turn SWAP Partition on (MBR)

mkswap /dev/[swap partition name]
swapon /dev/[swap partition name]

Mount ROOT Partition (MBR)

mount /dev/[root partition name] /mnt

Base System Installation

Update Mirrors using Reflector

reflector -c County1 -c Country2 -a 12 -p https --sort rate --save /etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist

Replace Country1 & Country2 with countries near to you or with the one you’re living in. Refer to Reflector for more info.

Install base system

pacstrap /mnt base base-devel linux linux-firmware linux-headers nano intel-ucode reflector mtools dosfstools
  • Replace linux with linux-hardened, linux-lts or linux-zen to install the kernel of your choice.
  • Replace linux-headers with Kernel type type of your choice respectively (e.g if you installed linux-zen then you will need linux-zen-headers).
  • Replace nano with editor of your choice (i.e vim or vi).
  • Replace intel-ucode with amd-ucode if you are using an AMD Processor.

Generate fstab

(use -U or -L to define by UUID or labels, respectively)

genfstab -U /mnt >> /mnt/etc/fstab

Check the resulting /mnt/etc/fstab file, and edit it in case of errors.

Chroot

arch-chroot /mnt

Create Swapfile (UEFI only)

Replace the below 4096 in count=4096 with double the amount of RAM installed your system. Not applicable on 16GB or more RAM.

dd if=/dev/zero of=/swapfile bs=1M count=4096 status=progress
chmod 600 /swapfile
mkswap /swapfile
swapon /swapfile

Add Swapfile entery in your /etc/fstab file (UEFI only)

/swapfile none swap defaults 0 0

Insert the above line at the bottom of /etc/fstab.

Set Time & Date

ln -sf /usr/share/zoneinfo/Region/City /etc/localtime
hwclock --systohc

Replace Region & City according to your Time zone. Refer to Time zone more info.

Set Language

We will use en_US.UTF-8 here but, if you want to set your language, replace en_US.UTF-8 with yours in all below instances.

Edit locale.gen

nano /etc/locale.gen

Uncomment the below line

#en_US.UTF-8 UTF-8

save & exit.

Generate Locale

locale-gen

Add LANG to locale.conf

echo LANG=en_US.UTF-8 > /etc/locale.conf

Add Keymaps to vconsole

For keyboard users with non US Eng only. Replace [keymap] with yours.

echo "KEYMAP=[keymap]" > /etc/vconsole.conf

Set Hostname

echo arch > /etc/hostname

Replace arch with hostname of your choice.

Set Hosts

nano /etc/hosts

add these lines to it

127.0.0.1    localhost
::1          localhost
127.0.1.1    arch.localdomain arch

Replace arch with hostname of your choice. save & exit.

Install & Enable NetworkManager

pacman -S networkmanager
systemctl enable NetworkManager

Set ROOT Password

passwd

Install GRUB Bootloader

pacman -S grub

Install EFI Boot manager (UEFI)

pacman -S efibootmgr

For UEFI System

grub-install --target=x86_64-efi --efi-directory=/boot/efi --bootloader-id=GRUB

For MBR System

grub-install --target=i386-pc /dev/[disk name]

Create Grub configuration file

grub-mkconfig -o /boot/grub/grub.cfg

Final Step

exit
umount -a
reboot

Now boot into your freshly installed Arch system

Login as ROOT

Add new User

useradd -mG wheel [username]

Replace [username] with your username of choice.

Set User Password

passwd [username]

Allow Wheel Group to use Sudo Commands

EDITOR=nano visudo

Find and uncomment the below line

#%wheel ALL=(ALL) ALL

save & exit.

Logout ROOT

exit

Login as USER

Check for updates

sudo pacman -Syu

Xorg & GPU Drivers

sudo pacman -S xorg [xf86-video-your gpu type]
  • For Nvidia GPUs, type nvidia & nvidia-settings. For more info/old GPUs, refer to Arch Wiki - Nvidia.
  • For newer AMD GPUs, type xf86-video-amdgpu.
  • For legacy Radeon GPUs like HD 7xxx Series & below, type xf86-video-ati.
  • For dedicated Intel Graphics, type xf86-video-intel.

Enable Multilib Repo (optional)

multilib contains 32-bit software and libraries that can be used to run and build 32-bit applications on 64-bit installs (e.g. Wine, Steam, etc).

Edit /etc/pacman.conf & uncomment the below two lines.

#[multilib]
#Include = /etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist

MESA Libraries (32bit)

This package is required by Steam if you play games using Vulkan Backend.

sudo pacman -S lib32-mesa

KDE Plasma & Applications

sudo pacman -S alacritty aria2 bat bat-extras bspwm btrfs-progs evince eza feh ffmpeg firefox-developer-edition flameshot font-manager gimp github-cli gpick htop jq lazygit lxappearance mesa-utils mesa-vdpau mpv ncdu neovim nnn noto-fonts noto-fonts-cjk noto-fonts-extra npm opendoas pass pavucontrol pulseaudio-alsa python-pip python-pipx renameutils reflector ripgrep rofi spotify-launcher stow strawberry sxhkd sxiv terraform thunar tipp10 tmux transmission-cli trash-cli unrar unzip vim wget xorg xorg-xinit zip zsh xf86-video-amdgpu polybar libva-mesa-driver libva-vdpau-driver libva-utils pacman-contrib go

Enable OpenSSH daemon

sudo systemctl enable sshd.service

Final Reboot

reboot

The Conclusion

Now everything is installed and after the final reboot, you will land in you GUI Login Screen ready to use your system. You can also do some extra steps mentioned below to further improve your experience. I’ll recommend you to install yay & paccache.

  • Yay will provide your packages from AUR (Arch User Repository), which are not available in the Official Repo.
  • Paccache can be used clean pacman cached packages either manually or in an automated way.

Extras (optional)

Install Yay

Yet Another Yogurt - An AUR Helper.

git clone https://aur.archlinux.org/yay.git
cd yay
makepkg -si

Install Zsh

Zsh is a powerful shell that operates as both an interactive shell and as a scripting language interpreter.

sudo pacman -S zsh zsh-completions

Read here for customisation & theming for Zsh. Read below how to change your SHELL.

Changing your SHELL

First check your current SHELL by running:

echo $SHELL

To get list of all available/installed SHELLs:

chsh -l

Set Zsh as our SHELL

For an example, we will set Zsh as default SHELL which we installed in the last step:

chsh -s /usr/bin/zsh

For the changes to apply, you will have Logout and Log back in or better do reboot.