Cart

/ Domain name

/ Your .CO.UK domain
for only £ 4.99**

Get started with your own domain names

Register now

/ Other

/ Latest news

Launch of new Big Storage platform

Read more
Need help?

    Sorry, we could not find any results for your search querry.

    Installing Arch Linux

    The installation of an Arch Linux VPS is started directly from the installation medium (an ISO file). Arch Linux is not delivered ready-to-use but gives you freedom on what is installed during the installation process. Before you begin the actual installation, we recommend reading through the FAQ of Arch Linux.

    In this article, we will show you how to perform the manual installation of Arch Linux. We use LVM partitioning for the installation.


     

    Step 1

    When your VPS is delivered, you automatically enter the live version of Arch Linux, which is recognizable by:

    root@archiso~#

    By default, your keyboard is set to US international. Available layouts can be found with:

    ls /usr/share/kbd/keymaps/**/*.map.gz

    The language on which your keyboard is set can be adjusted with the loadkeys command, for example:

    loadkeys de-latin1

     

    Step 2

    Your network connection is enabled, but the DHCP client is not yet available, so you do not get very far yet and, for example, you cannot ping yet. First enable dhcpcd with the command:

    dhcpcd

    Now test your connection using a ping command:

    ping -c 4 google.com

     

    Step 3 

    Check if your clock is set correctly with the command:

    timedatectl

    Is, for example, the local time an hour early? Then adjust your time zone (for example to Amsterdam):

    timedatectl set-timezone "Europe/Amsterdam"

    It is not advisable to adjust the Universal / RTC time, as this would lead to problems because of summertime for example.


     

    Step 4

    We recommend using LVM for partitioning your disk. Other options are beyond the scope of this manual.

    Check your available disks using the command:

    fdisk -l

    You will most likely see two: /dev/vda and /dev/loop0. We use the primary disk, in this case /dev/vda (you recognize your primary disk by the size displayed immediately behind it).

    In this manual, replace /dev/vda with the actual primary disk if it differs from this example.

    Now you create the Linux LVM partition using your entire disk, by successively using the following commands (in brackets there's an explanation):

    fdisk /dev/vda
    n (new partition)
    p (makes the new partition the primairy partition)
    1 (the partition number)
    <enter> (accepts the default settings)
    accepts the default settings

     

    Step 5

    Then you create an LVM physical volume on the new partition and create a volume group for it:

    pvcreate /dev/vda1
    vgcreate vg1 /dev/vda1

     

    Step 6

    Now create the boot, root, swap, and home logical volumes. You are free to adjust the allocated space, but for boot, we recommend using 200M.

    lvcreate -L 200M -n boot vg1
    lvcreate -L 20G -n root vg1
    lvcreate -L 4g -n swap vg1
    lvcreate -l 100%FREE -n home vg1 

     

    Step 7

    Then format the newly created logical volumes:

    mkfs.ext4 /dev/vg1/boot
    mkfs.ext4 /dev/vg1/root
    

     

    Step 8

    Finally, you mount your logical volumes:

    mount /dev/vg1/root /mnt
    mkdir /mnt/boot
    mount /dev/vg1/boot /mnt/boot
    mkdir /mnt/home
    mount /dev/vg1/home /mnt/home

     

    Step 9

    The partitioning is now completed. The changes that you have made above must, however, end up in /etc/fstab, but before you can generate the fstab file you first need the base packages (which contain bash, openssl, grep, keyutils, systemd, etc.) ). You install it with the command:

    pacstrap /mnt base

     

    Step 10

    Then generate the fstab file:

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

    Check the contents of /mnt/etc/fstab just to be sure and correct them if there are errors:

    nano /mnt/etc/fstab

    Step 11

    Change the root directory for the current processes (and child processes):

    arch-chroot /mnt /bin/bash

     

    Step 12

    Open/create the file /etc/locale.gen with vi or nano:

    nano /etc/locale.gen

    Look for the line #en_US.UTF-8 UTF-8 (or another layout if you want) and remove / uncomment the # so that the line looks like:

    en_US.UTF-8 UTF-8

    Save your changes and close the file (ctl + x> y> enter).


     

    Step 13

    Then generate the localization:

    locale-gen

     

    Step 14

    Create the file /etc/locale.conf with vi or nano:

    nano /etc/locale.conf

    You now create the LANG variable in this file by adding the following code (replace en_US.UTF-8 with your chosen localization):

    LANG=en_US.UTF-8

    Save your changes and close the file (ctl + x> y> enter).

    If you have set the keyboard layout, add the value KEYMAP=de-latin1 (replace de-latin1 with your chosen layout) in the file /etc/vconsole.conf


     

    Step 15 

    Create the file /etc/hostname with vi or nano: 

    nano /etc/hostname

    Add your hostname, for example with the syntax: 

    server.example.com

    Save your changes and close the file (ctl + x> y> enter).   


     

    Step 16 

    Create the file /etc/hosts with vi or nano: 

    nano /etc/hosts

    Add the following data, replacing server.example.com with your chosen hostname. 

    127.0.0.1      localhost
    ::1            localhost
    127.0.1.1      server.example.com.localdomain server.example.com

    Save your changes and close the file (ctl + x> y> enter).   


     

    Step 17 

    Then add an LVM2hook to initramfs. First, open the mkinitcpio.conf file:

    nano /etc/mkinitcpio.conf

    Adjust the line HOOKS= by placing lvm2 in front of filesystems. The result can then look like this: 

    HOOKS=(base udev autodetect modconf block lvm2 filesystems keyboard fsck)

    Save your changes and close the file (ctl + x> y> enter). Next, install lvm2 and the base-devel packages in order to be able to use mkinitcpio to regenerate the initramfs image:   

    mkinitcpio -p linux

     

    Step 18 

    We are almost there! Now adjust your root password:

    passwd

     

    Step 19 

    Finally, configure the bootloader. We use GRUB for this. First, you install GRUB:  

    pacman -S grub

    Install the boot loader to the disk on which you installed Arch with the command below. In this manual, this is /dev/vda. 

    You will see many lines when using the two commands below, such as 'Failed to connect to lvmetad. Falling back to device scanning' and 'Device /dev/loop0 not initialized in udev database even after waiting 10000000 microseconds'. These notifications are the result of /run not being available in chroot (see step 11) and you can safely ignore them. The whole process will take quite a while (at least fifteen minutes per command is not unusual).

    grub-install /dev/vda

    Finally, you generate the configuration file (this also takes a while):   

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

     

    Step 20

    Your installation is now complete! To exit the chroot environment, unmount your partitions and reboot as follows: 

    exit
    umount -R /mnt
    reboot

     

    You can now immediately start with the further configuration of Arch Linux and installing any additional packages you'd like.

    Should you have any questions left regarding this article, do not hesitate to contact our support department. You can reach them via the ‘Contact Us’ button at the bottom of this page.

    Was this article helpful?


    Provide feedback about this article

    Need help?

    Receive personal support from our supporters

    Contact us