Tag Archives: installation

arch install notes 2020-06

My install notes to get Arch Linux set up just the way I like it, June 2020 edition. Reference: https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Installation_guide

Change to dvorak layout:
loadkeys dvorak

Sync NTP time:
timedatectl set-ntp true

Configure disk:
fdisk
#create separate efi partition, LVM root & swap
pvcreate <dev>
vgcreate arch <dev>
lvcreate -L+2G arch -n swap
lvcreate -l100%FREE -n root arch

Initialize swap:
mkswap /dev/arch/swap
swapon /dev/arch/swap

Format & Mount root:
mkfs.ext4 /dev/arch/root
mount /dev/arch/root /mnt

Create EFI partition
mkdosfs -F32 <partition 1>
mkdir /mnt/efi
mount <partition 1> /mnt/efi

Make mirrorlist use only xmission
sed -i 's/^Server/#Server/g;s/#Server\(.*xmission.*\)/Server\1/g' /etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist

Install base system plus extra packages:
pacstrap /mnt base linux linux-firmware lvm2 efibootmgr samba vim htop networkmanager inetutils man-db man-pages texinfo openssh grub

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

Enter new environment chroot
arch-chroot /mnt

Set timezone
ln -sf /usr/share/zoneinfo/America/Boise /etc/localtime

Configure en_US locales
sed -i 's/^#en_US\(.*\)/en_US\1/g' /etc/locale.gen
locale-gen

Make dvorak layout permanent
echo "KEYMAP=dvorak" > /etc/vconsole.conf

Set hostname
echo "_HOSTNAME_" > /etc/hostname
echo "127.0.1.1 _HOSTNAME_._DOMAIN_ _HOSTNAME_" >> /etc/hosts

Enable lvm2 hook for initial ramdisk (boot)
sed -i 's/HOOKS=(.*\<block\>/& lvm2/' /etc/mkinitcpio.conf

Generate initial ramdisk
mkinitcpio -P

Set password for root user:
passwd

Install Grub (EFI)
grub-install --target=x86_64-efi --efi-directory=/efi --bootloader-id=GRUB
grub-mkconfig -o /boot/grub/grub.cfg

Enable networking & SSH on bootup:
systemctl enable NetworkManager sshd

Configure NTP
yum -y install ntp
#modify /etc/ntp.conf for timeservers as desired
systemctl enable ntpd

Exit chroot & reboot
exit
reboot

Installing Linux Mint 18.3 with NVIDIA GTX 1070

I became very frustrated when trying to install the latest Linux Mint on my desktop, which contains an NVIDIA GTX 1070 graphics card. No matter what I tried I couldn’t even get the live CD environment to show up. It would stay at text, and even play the login sound, but no matter what I pressed I couldn’t get anything to come up on the display.

After much digging I came across an Ubuntu forum post which directed me to this manual describing different boot-time options. I had read somewhere that you want nomodeset to be enabled, but that didn’t cut it. Finally after reading the Ubuntu options I found the second half – vga=791

So, to install (and run for the first time before installing NVIDIA drivers) Linux Mint on a machine that has an NVIDIA Geforce GTX 1070, you have to edit the grub startup options (by pressing esc / tab) and append the following to the kernel line:

nomodeset vga=791

Also, if you manually partition the installation, make sure that the /boot partition is EXT2. I had first installed it as EXT4 but ran into strange problems.. restarting and making it EXT2 made those problems go away.