How to Install Arch Linux: Beginner's Guide

Preamble

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Arch Linux is an extremely notorious distro, both for its difficulty of use and its unwelcoming community. But it does not need to be so daunting. I believe that Arch is not as difficult as its reputation suggests. I will attempt to make an extremely simple and understandable guide.

For this guide, you will need:

• a stable internet connection
• a USB flash drive with at least 4 Gb

Acquiring an ISO

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Arch Linux, like most operating systems, is distributed in the form of bootable .ISO files. The Arch Linux ISO file is mainly distributed via direct download, as well as a BitTorrent file. I personally recommend the Direct Download for the less tech-savvy, but if you have an unstable or slow connection, or want a faster download; go for the Torrent

Direct Download

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1. To download the Arch Linux ISO via direct download, first, you must go to the ISO mirror list: https://archlinux.org/download/#download-mirrors here, you can find your country in the list, and select the mirror closest to you.

   

2. Next, once you found the mirror you would like to use, click the link. You should now see a screen like this:

   

3. From this screen, you are going to want to click both the “archlinux-yyy.mm.dd-X86_64.iso”, as well as the “sha256sums.txt”. sha256sums.txt should open as a tab on your browser rather than downloading. Do not close this as we will need it later! now that you have the .ISO file on your system, you can now skip to the “Checksum” section!

Torrent Download

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Arch Linux provides both a magnet link, as well as a .torrent file. In this guide I will show you how to use the magnet link.

1. Go to archlinux.org/download/ and click “magnet link” under the “BitTorrent Download” section. Alternatively, you can click here to go straight to the magnet. While you are on archlinux.org/download, scroll down to the section titled “Checksums and signatures”, and click “Sha256sums.txt”, as this is needed for the next step

2. once you click the link, you should see a box like this:

   

Click “Choose Application”. Then the box should show a list of apps able to open magnet links. If qBitTorrent is your only torrent client, it should already be selected. Now just press “Open Link”

3. Now, qBitTorrent should Open and you should see a screen like this:

   

This screen may look busy, but all you need to do is press “OK” in the bottom right corner. You can also use the “Save at” section, to select what folder qBitTorrent puts the Arch ISO.

4. You should now see a screen like this:

   

   except it should show a progress bar, and say the status is “Downloading”. It should be done very quickly, much faster than if you use direct download. You will know it has completed when the status says “Seeding”. When this happens, please keep the torrent seeding for as long as you are able, as the only reason you were able to download this file, was because hundreds of others are seeding the file too. I recommend seeding until you have reached a ratio of at least 1.50.

Checksum

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Now that you have the installation file, you need to check it to make sure it’s not corrupted. To do this, we will be using an online checksum tool in order to keep this process simple. Go to emn178.github.io/online-tools/sha256_checksum. Here, you should see a page like this:

Either click the input box, or drag and drop your Linux .ISO file into it, and press “Hash”.

This process should take a few minutes, and at the end, the “Output” box should show a string of characters. In my case, it showed: c0ee0dab0a181c1d6e3d290a81ae9bc41c329ecaa00816ca7d62a685aeb8d972

Now that you have your ISO hash, you will need to go back to the “sha256sums.txt” page we opened earlier. Here, you should see a bunch of numbers, next to a bunch of file names, like this:

We are going to want to make sure this string is Identical to the string we were given from the online tool. I like to use text-compare.com. To quickly compare the two strings.

Creating a bootable USB

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Now that we have our .iso file, the next step is to burn it onto a USB drive that we can use to boot our computer. For this, we will be using a software called “Balena Etcher” because it is cross-platform.

1. First, you need to install Balena Etcher from etcher.balena.io

2. Once you have Balena Etcher installed, you should see a screen like this:

   

3. First, click “Flash From file”, and select the .ISO file you just downloaded.

4. Next, insert your USB flash drive, and press “Select target”, and click your flash drive from the list. Balena Etcher is useful for beginners because by default, it hides system drives from the selection. Regardless, make ABSOLUTELY SURE this is the right drive, as this will wipe everything from it.

5. Finally, press “Flash!”. You should now see a screen like this:

   

   this will take some time, so feel free to do other stuff while you wait.

Once you see this:

Booting into your Arch Drive

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Now that you have the USB flash drive, You are going to plug it into the computer you want to install Arch Linux on, and power it off completely. In order to boot from the USB drive, you need to spam-press a specific keyboard button while the computer is powering up. What button this is depends on the manufacturer of the motherboard. Below is a list of common boot menu keys, courtesy of fixmestick.com

The appearance of the boot menu depends greatly on the model of computer you are using, but generally looks something like this:

Use the arrow keys to move the selector to this entry, and press Enter!

Once you select your drive, you should be put into another menu that looks like this:

This menu skips after a few seconds, but if it has not, just press enter on the 1st option to enter the install menu. A lot of text will fly by your screen for a few seconds, after that, if everything worked, this should show up:

This is the Arch Linux install screen, and now that we see it, we can move on to the next step.

Keyboard layout and internet

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Keyboard Layout

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By default, Arch Linux uses the US keyboard layout, but if you use a different keyboard layout, you are going to want to change that ASAP. To do that, we are going to be using the loadkeys command.

First, to get the list of supported layouts by typing:

localectl list-keymaps

This should bring you to a list of keyboard layouts like this:

Simply use the up and down arrow keys to navigate this list, and look for the keyboard layout you want. Once you have found the name of the layout you use, press “q” to exit the list, and type

loadkeys <LAYOUT NAME>

And replace LAYOUT NAME with the name of the layout you want to use.

Connecting to the internet

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To connect your computer to Wi-Fi, first enter the Wi-Fi menu by typing:

iwctl

If this worked, you should see green text to the left of the screen. Now you need to get the name of your Wi-Fi adapter by typing:

device list

On most computers, you should see only one entry, likely named something similar to wlan0

Now to get the list of available Wi-Fi networks, type:

station <YOUR_ADAPTER_NAME> get-networks

Now find the name of your Wi-Fi network from the list and type:

station <YOUR_ADAPTER_NAME> connect <WIFI_NAME>

It should now prompt you to enter your Wi-Fi password. Once you do that, you should be connected!

To test your connection, type:

ping -c 3 zuulie.ca

If your internet is working, this command will work, and you should see lines starting with <x> bytes from...

Partitioning the disks

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To partition our disks, we will be using a tool called “cfdisk”.

First we must enter cfdisk by simply typing

cfdisk

You should be greeted with a screen like this:

Press Enter on the “gpt” option, and you should now see a screen like this:

If you have not wiped your drives yet, you may see many entries on this list. Hover over each one with up and down arrows, and press enter on “delete” at the bottom, selecting it with left and right arrows

Once the only entry on that list is “Free space”; hover over it and press “New”

You should see “Partition size:” at the bottom. Use backspace to delete what is already there. Type:

1G

And press enter

you should now see a new entry on the list. Now use the up and down arrow keys to hover over the “Free space” entry again, and once again press “New”.

This time, type:

4G

And press “Enter”.

Once more press new on free space, but this time, just press enter again, leaving the size as default.

You should see something like this:

Finally. Press “Write”, and type “yes”

We are now done with cfdisk, so press “Quit” to close it.

Now run the command:

lsblk

You should see the 3 entries you just made labeled <DISK NAME> 1, 2, and 3 like this:

Now that we have made our partitions, it’s time to partition them. Each partition we made is for a specific purpose.

First, find the largest partition, in my screenshot it would be vda3 but yours will be different. We will use this partition as our root filesystem, where we store everything from downloads to the OS files. To create this filesystem, run:

mkfs.ext4 /dev/<DISK_NAME_3>

Next we will make our Swap partition. This partition acts as virtual ram, allowing your PC to function when the ram is at max capacity. This would be partition 2 in our case, and named vda2 for me. Run the command:

mkswap /dev/<DISK_NAME_2>

Finally, we will make our EFI partition. This partition stores the files and information our computer needs to boot up properly and open up Arch Linux. This will be disk 1 in our case, and vda1 for me. Run the command:

mkfs.fat -F 32 /dev/<DISK_NAME_1>

Now that we have made our filesystems, the last thing to do is mount them! run these 3 commands:

mount /dev/<DISK_NAME_3> /mnt

swapon /dev/<DISK_NAME_2>

mount --mkdir /dev/DISK_NAME_1 /mnt/boot

Now when you run lsblk you should see this:

Installing Packages

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Now that all the disk stuff is out of the way, it’s time to download our programs! this part of the guide is going to be one big command with a bunch of options. I will first go over the base command and the necessities, then I will go over the situational additions

We will be running the command:

pacstrap -K /mnt base linux linux-firmware sof-firmware base-devel grub efibootmgr nano man-db networkmanager <OPTIONAL PACKAGES HERE>

If your computer uses:

• An AMD CPU: add “amd-ucode” to the pacstrap

• An Intel CPU: add “intel-ucode” to the pacstrap

• Multiple Operating Systems: add “os-prober” to the pacstrap

Once you have every package you need added to the pacstrap list, press “Enter” and watch the magic!

Fstab

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Okay, now that we are done with the fun part, time to go back to the boring technical stuff.

First, we need to generate a “Fstab” file. This file tells the system what disks to mount on startup, saving us from needing to re-mount them every time. All you need to do is run:

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

Now it’s time to enter our new system. To do this, we will run the command:

arch-chroot /mnt

Once you do this, the prompt will change from red to gray, indicating that you are now in the installed system rather than the USB

Localization and time

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It is now time to set our timezone and locale. The first step to this is to set our time zone. To do this, we will run the command:

ln -sf /usr/share/zoneinfo/<Region>/<City> /etc/localtime

“Region” is typically the continent you live on, and “City” is the nearest major city. In my case, since I live in southern Ontario, I would put: ln -sf /usr/share/zoneinfo/America/Toronto /etc/localtime

Next, we need to sync our hardware clock with the command:

hwclock --systohc

Next we need to set our locale. First, run the command:

nano /etc/locale.gen

This will open the file locale.gen in “nano” a keyboard based text editor. It should look like this:

Use the arrow keys to scroll down until you find your locale. Typically it’s

#<first_2_letters_of_language>_<FIRST_2_LETTERS_OF_COUNTRY> utf-8

In my case it’s: #en_CA UTF-8

You need to use the arrow keys and backspace to delete the # before the code, then press Ctrl + X then y then Enter

Now that we have selected our locale in the file, it’s time to run the file to actually set it as our locale. To do this, run:

locale-gen

You should now see the name of the locale you generated in the command prompt, as well as “Generation complete”. If you don’t, double check that the locale is properly uncommented in the file. Please keep a note of exactly what locale you selected, as it is needed for the next step.

Now we need to once again use nano, this time running

nano /etc/locale.conf

In this file, we are going to type:

LANG=<LOCALE>.UTF-8

In my case it would be LANG=en_CA.UTF-8

Once again we are going to press Ctrl + X then y then Enter

Finally, we set our keyboard layout. To do this we type:

nano /etc/vconsole.conf

In this file, you want to type:

KEYMAP=<KEYBOARD_LAYOUT>

With “KEYBOARD_LAYOUT” being the layout you want.

Once again, press Ctrl + X then y then Enter.

Hostname, password, and User

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It’s time to set our hostname. This is going to be our computer’s name. To set it, type:

nano /etc/hostname

Then just type whatever you want your computer to be called, and Ctrl + X then y then Enter.

Now we need to set our root password. This password is important so don’t forget it!

passwd

Then just follow the instructions on screen to set your password

Now let’s add our user account! run the command:

useradd -m -G wheel -s /bin/bash <NAME>

Set NAME to be whatever you want your account to be called

Now set your user password with

passwd <NAME>

Setting up sudo

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To be able to do administrator level tasks from your account, such as installing programs, you are going to need to set up “sudo”. Sudo is a prefix you can add to any command to run it as an administrator, similar to Windows “Run as Administrator.”

To get started, run:

EDITOR=nano visudo

This command will open up a big file full of text.

Scroll down until you see this line: ##Uncomment to allow all members of group wheel to execute any command

You are going to scroll to the line directly Below that message, and remove the “#” it should look like this:

Once you have done that, save and close it using “Ctrl + x”.

enabling NetworkManager

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To enable network manager, run this command

systemctl enable NetworkManager

Grub

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Now for the final step before rebooting. This is the step I find the most people struggle with, so follow the instructions carefully!

First run:

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

Next run;

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

Reboot

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Now we are done setting up Arch. It’s time to restart our computer!

Type:

exit

Then type;

umount -a

Finally type:

reboot

If all went well, you should see grub for a few seconds, then automatically be put into the Arch console! now that this is done, it’s time for the fun part

Picking a Desktop Environment

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Linux comes with many different desktop systems, each with their own look and feel, as well as entire suites of apps. You can also install a Window Manager such as i3 or Hyprland (my wm of choice), but that is beyond the scope of this guide.

KDE plasma

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Pick this if you want:

• An all-inclusive desktop experience
• A Windows-like feel
• Great customizability
• Large suite of KDE apps
• An active dev team

To install KDE plasma on your Arch machine, run

sudo pacman -S plasma-meta sddm KDE-applications-meta konsole kate firefox

Then to start, run

sudo systemctl enable --now sddm

GNOME

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GNOME is the default choice for many of the most popular Linux distributions. It offers sleek, modern look but lacks many customization features

Pick this if you want:

• Opinionated design
• Mac like feel
• Set it and forget it design
• Corporate backing

To install, run:

sudo pacman -S gnome gnome-circle firefox 

To run:

sudo systemctl enable --now gdm

Xfce

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Xfce is a popular choice for low-power machines. It lacks many of the flashy features of other Desktop Environments, but thrives in pure performance and speed

Pick this if you want:

• A light Desktop Environment
• A smooth experience for a low-power machine
• Low ram usage
• Smooth and stable experience

To install, run:

sudo pacman -S xfce4 xfce4-goodies firefox sddm

to run:

sudo systemctl enable --now sddm

final tips

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• To update Arch, run

sudo pacman -Syu

• I recommend installing an AUR helper to get the most out of Arch. I recommend YAY

  

  Jguer/yay

  Yet another Yogurt - An AUR Helper written in Go

  Go

  13210

  394

• if you want to game, you will need to set up graphics drivers. I may write a guide on this in the future