Arch Linux Install -- Part I -- OS

arch-install-part1.org

Arch Linux Basic Install

Device Meta

File Integrity Signatures

MD5

1d6bdf5cbc6ca98c31f02d23e418dd96

SHA1

67cf5460beb42230a9c07fd6ebc136cbb1181948

Set Partitions

NOTE mklabel gpt erases the current partition table, i.e. your data gets wiped.

parted /dev/sda
(parted) mklabel gpt
(parted) mkpart primary fat32 1MiB 512MiB
(parted) set 1 esp on
(parted) set 1 boot on
(parted) mkpart primary ext2 512MiB 35.5GB 
(parted) mkpart primary linux-swap 35.5GB 40.5GB
(parted) mkpart primary ext4 40.5GB 100%
(parted) print
(parted) quit

Format Partitions

mkfs.vfat -F32 /dev/sda1
mkfs.ext2 /dev/sda2
mkfs.ext4 /dev/sda4
mkswap /dev/sda3
swapon /dev/sda3

NOTE You do not need to mount swap

Mount Partitions

mkdir /mnt/boot
mkdir /mnt/boot
mkdir /mnt/home
mount /dev/sda1
mount /dev/sda2 /mnt
mount /dev/sda4 /mnt/home

NOTE Some people use /mnt/boot/efi or /mnt/efi, I just use /mnt/boot.

I’ve tried both the other ways a shit load of times and contrary to the documentation grub does not it would seem, automatically look for it in /boot/efi, it’s probably meant to but that has not been my experience. So I just use the boot directory and specify the flags when running grub-install given below.

Install Base Packages

NOTE If pacstrap returns 404 error change mirror list priority by moving a mirror to top of list

/etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist.

pacstrap /mnt base base-devel linux-headers grub-efi-x86_64 emacs git efibootmgr dialog wpa_supplicant intel-ucode 

NOTE Needed the linux-headers or linux-lts-headers for pdf-tools in Emacs.

Generate fstab

genfstab -pU /mnt > /mnt/etc/fstab

Enter New System

arch-chroot /mnt /bin/bash

Set Hostname

echo MYHOSTNAME > /etc/hostname

Set Locale

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

Uncomment en_US.UTF-8 in /etc/locale.gen then locale-gen

Set Root Password

passwd

Create User

useradd -m -g users -G wheel,storage,power -s /bin/bash MYUSERNAME
passwd MYUSERNAME

Regenerate initrd Image

mkinitcpio -p linux

Setup Grub

grub-install --bootloader-id=Arch_Linux --efi-directory=/boot/efi --recheck --target=x86_64-efi
grub-mkconfig -o /boot/grub/grub.cfg

Unmount Partitions and Reboot

exit
umount -R /mnt
reboot

If everything went well, this ends the basic installation OS phase.