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Installing Arch Linux [ ANY GPU | DUALBOOT FRIENDLY ]

#manuall #dualboot #gnome+gdm #encrypted #lvm #nvidia-friendly

This guide will help you manually install Arch Linux alongside an existing OS (without wiping any drives). In my case, I'm already using Arch on my primary machine and don’t want to reconfigure it, so I will be installing it on my gaming PC alongside a Windows 11 installation.

If you're already familiar with Unix systems or have ADHD like me and prefer a more concise approach, check out the TL;DR Guide for a quicker, text-light version.

Table of Contents

Pre-Installation Steps

1. Verify Your Existing OS Boot Mode

  • Boot into your current operating system.
  • Find the system information.
  • Ensure that the BIOS mode is set to UEFI.

2. Disable Secure Boot

  • Reboot your PC and enter the UEFI Firmware settings.
  • Depending on your motherboard, navigate to the security section and find the "Secure Boot" option. Disable it.
  • It is also recommended to disable Fast Boot for a smoother installation process.

3. Create Unallocated Space on Your Disk

  • If you have an empty drive that you plan to use for Arch, you can skip this step.
  • In your existing OS, open Disk Management.
  • Select the disk you want to install Arch on.
  • Shrink the partition on this disk. It is recommended to allocate at least 200 GB of unallocated space if you intend to use Arch for work or gaming.
  • You should now have unallocated space available for the Arch installation.

4. Create a Bootable USB

  • Download the Arch Linux .iso file from a trusted source. The official website is a good option.
  • Use a reliable tool to create a bootable USB drive. I recommend Rufus for Windows users.
  • Plug in a new USB stick and open Rufus.
  • Select your USB drive and the downloaded Arch Linux .iso file.
  • Choose the GPT partition scheme and the FAT32 file system.
  • Press Start to begin creating the bootable USB.

Installing Arch Linux

1. Boot from the USB

  • Plug the bootable USB into your PC.
  • [Windows] Hold down the Shift key while clicking Restart. Then, choose Troubleshoot > Advanced Options > UEFI Firmware Settings, and click Restart.
  • [Any OS] Alternatively, reboot and press your boot menu key (e.g., F8 or F12, depending on your motherboard) while booting.
  • In the Boot menu, select the USB drive and press Enter.

2. Enter the Arch Linux Installer

  • When you see the Arch Linux boot menu, select the default option to start the installation. You can simply press Enter.

3. Connect to the Network

To begin, you'll need a network connection. Check if your system has an IP address by typing:

ip addr show

If you see an IP address listed, you're good to go. If not, you'll need to connect via Wi-Fi or Ethernet.

Connect via Wi-Fi

iwctl

List the available devices:

station wlan0 get-networks

Remember the {network_name} you need and exit the interactive menu:

exit

Connect to your Wi-Fi network:

iwctl station wlan0 connect {network_name} --passphrase "{password}"

Check if you have an IP address:

ip addr show

Connect via Ethernet cable

I mean, just plug it in. That's it.

2. Identify the Disk for Installation

To find the disk you'll be using for the installation, use the following command:

lsblk

This will list all the storage volumes attached to your system. Identify the disk where you want to install Arch Linux. For example, if your disk is labeled /dev/nvme0n1, that's the one you'll target.

Note: Be sure to choose the correct disk. You can check the size column in the output of lsblk to confirm the drive you're targeting.

In my case: It will be /dev/nvme1n1 where I have a 1TB SSD drive, with only 600GB already partitioned as my Steam storage for Windows 11.

3. Partition the Disk

Now that you've identified your disk, it's time to partition it using fdisk. To start fdisk, use this command:

fdisk /dev/{disk_id}

Replace {disk_id} with the correct disk identifier for your system. We'll be wiping the existing partitions and creating new ones.

In my case:

fdisk /dev/nvme1n1

  • Press p to print the current partition table (this is just to see what’s currently there).

  • Press m to print all the available commands (basically a manual).

  • Press g to create a new GPT partition table. (This will fucking erase your disk, I warned you.)

    WARNING: If you want to erase your disk and create partitions from scratch - it's your choice, but think wisely. If you accidentally hit g, don't panic. It will not apply until you write the changes, so you can safely leave (^C).

  • Press n to create a new partition. You will be prompted for partition numbers, sizes, etc.

    • Partition 1: This will be for the swap partition. (See note.)

    • Partition 2: This will be for the EFI partition (1 GB).

    • Partition 3: This will be for the boot partition (2 GB).

    • Partition 4: The remaining space will be used for LVM (Logical Volume Manager), which will hold the rest of the system.

      NOTE: Swap partition isn't necessary, but recommended, especially if you don't have a lot of RAM. In my case: I have 64GB of RAM, but I'm still going to create a swap of 32GB. Rule of thumb is to create at least 1x of your RAM, but if you have 64GB or more, you don’t need to burn that much disk space. Just use 1/2 of your RAM size.

Once you've finished partitioning, type t to change the partition type:

  • Set Partition 4 to type 44 (Linux LVM).

4. Write the Changes

WARNING: Before writing the changes, I highly recommend you press p a bunch of times and fourple check that everything is okay. There is no way back after you write your changes, and if you did something wrong, just go and cry. You were warned.

Now that the partitions are created, write the changes to disk: w. This will delete the existing partition table and apply your new partitions.

5. Create SWAP Space

  • Use gdisk -l /dev/{disk_id} to verify the partition table and take note of the partition number assigned to Swap.
  • Enable swap by typing:
mkswap -L "Linux Swap" /dev/{swap_partition_id}
swapon /dev/{swap_partition_id}
  • Verify status of swap space by typing:
free -m

If the last line starts with "Swap:", we're good.

Future Disk/Partition namings

  • Disk: Will be referred as Disk: {disk_id}.
  • Partition 1: Will be referred as Swap Partition: {swap_partition_id}.
  • Partition 2: Will be referred as EFI Partition: {efi_partition_id}.
  • Partition 3: Will be referred as Boot Partition: {boot_partition_id}.
  • Partition 4: Will be referred as Main Partition: {main_partition_id}. I don't want to call it root so there will be more visual difference between boot and main. Huh, got you covered.

In my case:

  • disk_id is /dev/nvme1n1
  • swap_partition_id is /dev/nvme1n1p3
  • efi_partition_id is /dev/nvme1n1p4
  • boot_partition_id is /dev/nvme1n1p5
  • main_partition_id is /dev/nvme1n1p6

6. Format the Partitions

Format the EFI Partition:

mkfs.fat -F32 /dev/{efi_partition_id}

Now format the Boot Partition:

mkfs.ext4 /dev/{boot_partition_id}

7. Encrypt and Set Up LVM on Main Partition

Encrypt the third partition:

cryptsetup luksFormat /dev/{main_partition_id}

It will prompt you to type YES to confirm the operation. It will then prompt you to enter and verify a passphrase. Make sure you don’t lose or forget it—if you do, well, just cry, I guess. I don’t know.

Unlock the partition for further usage:

cryptsetup open --type luks /dev/{main_partition_id} lvm

Next, create the LVM physical volume:

pvcreate /dev/mapper/lvm

Then, create a volume group:

vgcreate vg0 /dev/mapper/lvm

Finally, create logical volumes for root (30G) and home (remaining space):

lvcreate -L 30G vg0 -n lv_root
lvcreate -l 100%FREE vg0 -n lv_home

To verify everything, list the volume groups:

vgdisplay

Then, list the logical volumes:

lvdisplay

Ensure that the vg0 volume group and the lv_root and lv_home logical volumes are present.

Insert dm_mod kernel module

modprobe dm_mod

Scan for available volume groups

vgscan

Activate available volume groups

vgchange -ay

8. Format Logical Volumes

Format the root partition:

mkfs.ext4 /dev/vg0/lv_root

Format the home partition:

mkfs.ext4 /dev/vg0/lv_home

9. Mount the Partitions

Mount the partitions:

mount /dev/vg0/lv_root /mnt
mkdir /mnt/boot
mount /dev/{boot_partition_id} /mnt/boot
mkdir /mnt/home
mount /dev/vg0/lv_home /mnt/home

10. Install Arch Linux Base System

Install the base system packages:

pacstrap -i /mnt base

11. Generate the File System Table (fstab)

Generate an fstab file:

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

Verify your fstab file:

cat /mnt/etc/fstab

You should have 3 partitions listed here. /, /boot, /home.

Setting up In-progress installation

1. Chroot into In-progress installation

Change root into the new installation to configure it further:

arch-chroot /mnt

Your command prompt will change — don’t worry, that’s normal. It may not be colorful or fancy anymore, but we’ll fix that later.

We're now inside your in-progress installation, so technically, this is already your Arch system—it just won’t function on its own yet. Let’s fix that.

2. Set up users

Set the root password

passwd

Make sure to set a strong password for the root user. It's the most important account on your system.

Create a new user

-m creates the user's home directory. -g is the primary group -G is the secondary group -s is the shell.

useradd -m -g users -G wheel -s /bin/bash {username}

Replace {username} with your desired username. It is recommended to add the new user to the wheel group to allow them to use sudo.

Set the password for the new user

passwd {username}

Please don't use the same password as the root user. It's not a good practice.

3. Install Required Packages

pacman -S base-devel dosfstools grub efibootmgr networkmanager gnome gnome-tweaks lvm2 mtools nano openssh os-prober sudo
  • base-devel includes the necessary tools for compiling and building packages from the Arch User Repository (AUR).
  • dosfstools is required for managing FAT filesystems.
  • grub is the bootloader.
  • efibootmgr is required for UEFI systems.
  • networkmanager is a network connection manager.
  • gnome is the GNOME desktop environment.
  • gnome-tweaks is a tool for customizing GNOME.
  • lvm2 is the Logical Volume Manager, system needs this to boot properly on LVM.
  • mtools is required for managing FAT filesystems.
  • nano is a simple text editor. You can replace it with vim if you prefer. You can also go ahead and install neovim if you're a cool kid, then spend the next 3 days configuring it. I'll do that later, in the post-installation steps.
  • openssh is the OpenSSH server.
  • os-prober is required for detecting other operating systems.
  • sudo is the superuser command, so users can run commands as root.

Just press Enter couple of times to install all the packages. It will take a while.

4. Enabling SSH

If you installed the openssh package, you probably want to enable the SSH server:

systemctl enable sshd

5. Install linux kernel

We are currently missing the kernel, so let's install it:

pacman -S linux linux-headers

You may also want to install the linux-lts package for a more stable kernel. In case you have any issues with the latest kernel, you can boot into the LTS kernel.

pacman -S linux-lts linux-lts-headers

You will probably need to install linux-firmware package as well:

pacman -S linux-firmware

6. Installing Video Drivers

Determining the correct video drivers for your system is crucial. If you don't know which VGA device you have, you can use the lspci command to list all PCI devices. grep VGA will filter the list to show only VGA devices.

lspci | grep VGA

You will see the VGA device listed. In my case, it's an NVIDIA card.

08:00.0 VGA compatible controller: NVIDIA Corporation AD103 [GeForce RTX 4080] (rev a1)

NVIDIA

Click to expand If you have an NVIDIA card, you will need to install the proprietary drivers. You can do this by installing the `nvidia` & `nvidia-utils` package:

If you installed the LTS kernel, you will also need to install the nvidia-lts package.

pacman -S nvidia nvidia-utils nvidia-lts

I will also need to update my mkinitcpio to include the nvidia module:

nano /etc/mkinitcpio.conf

# In order to save the file, press `Ctrl + O`, then `Enter`. To exit, press `Ctrl + X`.

Find the MODULES line and add nvidia to it. It should look like this:

MODULES=(nvidia nvidia_modeset nvidia_uvm nvidia_drm)

We will skip the rebuilding of the initramfs image for now, as we will need to configure it further and then we can rebuild it.

I also need to update my grub configuration to include the nvidia module:

nano /etc/default/grub

# In order to save the file, press `Ctrl + O`, then `Enter`. To exit, press `Ctrl + X`.

Find the GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT line and add nvidia-drm.modeset=1 to it, before quit. It should look like this:

GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="loglevel=3 nvidia_drm.modeset=1 quiet"

You may also need to modify /etc/modprobe.d/nvidia.conf:

nano /etc/modprobe.d/nvidia.conf

to include the following:

options nvidia-drm modeset=1 fbdev=1

We also need to run this command, or GDM won’t start:

WAIT: We need to install and enable gdm first! I’ll cover that in the upcoming steps. Skip for now, it will remain here for troubleshooting purposes.

ln -s /dev/null /etc/udev/rules.d/61-gdm.rules

AMD / INTEL

Click to expand

You will need to install mesa and intel-media-driver or libva-mesa-driver according to your hardware:

# For Intel
pacman -S mesa intel-media-driver

# For AMD
pacman -S mesa libva-mesa-driver

7. Generating Ram Disks for our Kernels

We need to regenerate the initramfs image for our kernels, but before that, we need to configure it.

Configure mkinitcpio

nano /etc/mkinitcpio.conf

# In order to save the file, press `Ctrl + O`, then `Enter`. To exit, press `Ctrl + X`.

Find the HOOKS line and add encrypt & lvm2 before filesystems. It should look like this:

HOOKS=(base udev autodetect microcode modconf kms keyboard keymap consolefont block filesystems fsck)
->
HOOKS=(base udev autodetect microcode modconf kms keyboard keymap consolefont block encrypt lvm2 filesystems fsck)

Otherwise, you will not be able to boot into your system, because it won't be able to decrypt the encrypted partition. And without lvm2, it won't be able to find the logical volumes. So, it's crucial to have them in the correct order.

Rebuild the initramfs image for your kernel(s):

mkinitcpio -p linux

If you're using the LTS kernel, you will need to rebuild the initramfs image for it as well:

mkinitcpio -p linux-lts

Make sure you see lvm2 and encrypt in the output. If you don't, you probably forgot to add them to the HOOKS line or save the file. Go back and check.

Ignore any Warnings, they are just warnings. We don't care about them, right?

8. Let's configure time zones and locales

Locale

Edit the locale file:

nano /etc/locale.gen

Uncomment the locales you want to use. For example, if you want to use en_US.UTF-8, uncomment this line:

en_US.UTF-8 UTF-8

Uncommenting means removing the # at the beginning of the line.

Generate the locales:

locale-gen

Set the locale:

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

Time Zone

List the available regions:

ls -l /usr/share/zoneinfo

Choose your zone and list the available cities:

ls -l /usr/share/zoneinfo/{region}

Set the time zone:

ln -sf /usr/share/zoneinfo/{region}/{city} /etc/localtime

Sync the hardware clock:

hwclock --systohc

In my case:

ln -sf /usr/share/zoneinfo/Asia/Almaty /etc/localtime

9. Set the Hostname & Hosts File

Edit the hostname file:

nano /etc/hostname

Set your hostname. For example:

my-arch-pc-btw

Edit the hosts file:

nano /etc/hosts

Add the following lines:

127.0.0.1   localhost
::1         localhost
127.0.1.1   my-arch-pc-btw.localdomain my-arch-pc-btw

Replace my-arch-pc-btw with your hostname. In my case, it will be gingerarch.

10. Configure Grub

Edit the grub configuration file:

nano /etc/default/grub

Find the GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT line and add cryptdevice=/dev/{main_partition_id}:vg0 to it, before quiet. It should look like this:

GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="loglevel=3 cryptdevice=/dev/{main_partition_id}:vg0 quiet"

In my case:

GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="loglevel=3 nvidia_drm.modeset=1 cryptdevice=/dev/nvme1n1p6:vg0 quiet"

Nvidia users should also add nvidia-drm.modeset=1 to the line if they haven't already.

Mount the EFI partition:

mkdir /boot/efi
mount /dev/{efi_partition_id} /boot/efi

In my case:

mkdir /boot/efi
mount /dev/nvme1n1p4 /boot/efi

Install grub:

grub-install --target=x86_64-efi --bootloader-id=grub_uefi --recheck --removable /dev/{disk_id}

In my case:

grub-install --target=x86_64-efi --bootloader-id=grub_uefi --recheck --removable /dev/nvme1n1

Copy grub locale:

cp /usr/share/locale/en\@quot/LC_MESSAGES/grub.mo /boot/grub/locale/en.mo

Make grub configuration:

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

11. Enable GDM

Enable the GDM service:

systemctl enable gdm

IF you ended up not having gdm installed, you can install it by running:

pacman -S gdm

FOR NVIDIA USERS: If you have an NVIDIA card and GDM won’t start, you must run this command:

ln -s /dev/null /etc/udev/rules.d/61-gdm.rules

12. Enable NetworkManager

Enable the NetworkManager service:

systemctl enable NetworkManager

13. Exit Chroot

Exit the chroot environment:

exit

14. Unmount Partitions

Unmount the partitions:

umount -R /mnt

Ignores any errors, they are just errors. We don't care about them, right?

15. Reboot

Reboot your system:

reboot

Don't forget to remove the USB stick from your PC. You might also need to open your BOOT menu and select the correct boot device in some cases.

It should ask you for the passphrase you set up for the encrypted partition. If you don't see the passphrase prompt, you probably forgot to add cryptdevice=/dev/{main_partition_id}:vg0 to the GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT line in the grub configuration file.

The system should boot into the GDM login screen. You can now log in with your user account and start customizing your Arch Linux installation.

If on the GDM login screen you see a black screen with an underscore, you probably forgot to run the ln -s /dev/null /etc/udev/rules.d/61-gdm.rules command. Or any other steps in the NVIDIA section.

Post-Installation Steps

I will cover the post-installation steps in a separate guide. This guide is already too long, and I don't want to overwhelm you with too much information at once. I will cover the following topics in the post-installation guide that will be available soon.

You might want to edit the sudoers file to allow your user to use sudo without entering a password. This is optional, but it can be convenient.

nano /etc/sudoers

Just find the wheel group and uncomment that line.

## Uncomment to allow members of group wheel to execute any command
%wheel ALL=(ALL:ALL) ALL

Youtube guide

If you prefer a video guide, It will be available soon.

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Installing Arch Linux [ ANY GPU | DUALBOOT ]

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