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Arch Linux Installation with Windows Dual-Boot

Published: 2025-08-28

Last Updated: 2025-06-30

by @notkaramel

Prerequisite

  • USB Drive (at least 1.2GB) with archiso
    • From Windows: Use rufus to flash ISO to drive
    • From Linux:
      • Using rpi-imager (AUR) via custom image
      • MultiWriter gnome-multi-writer

Network Configuration

  • Using wired connection is preferable
  • archiso has iwctl built-in. It can connect to regular IEEE 802.11x wifi, i.e., Wifi with SSID and passphrase.

Booting & Partition

  • Update system clock
timedatectl set-ntp true
  • Using fdisk for partitioning
fdisk -l # list all partitions
fdisk /dev/device # e.g.: /dev/sda, /dev/nvme0n1
  • Now you're inside fdisk CLI: m for help menu

    1. If fresh install, or disk not GPT, do g to create new empty GPT table

    2. n: new partition

      • Partition number: go by default or your preferred order
      • First sector: rcm go by default
      • Last sector: use +SIZE to set partition size (e.g.: +500MiB, +2G)

    3. t: change partition type

      • Partition number: remember from previously determined
      • L for option menu, Q to quit menu
      • Recommend GPT table:
      Partition # Type (t option) Size
      EFI System 1 EFI (1) +600MiB
      Swap (optional) 2 Linux swap (19) +4GiB
      Root 3 Linux root (23) +50GiB
      Home 4 Linux home (42) the rest

Partition a swap if the PC has low RAM (swap's size should be 2x RAM) 3. w: write table to disk and exit 4. q: quit without saving changes

  • Format partitions
mkfs.fat -F 32 /dev/EFI_Partition
mkswap /dev/SWAP_Partition
mkfs.ext4 /dev/ROOT_and_HOME
  • Mounting & activate partitions
swapon /dev/SWAP_Partition
mount /dev/ROOT /mnt			
mount /dev/HOME /mnt/home   
mount --mkdir /dev/EFI /mnt/boot 	// for the EFI file system
  • Edit /etc/pacman.conf and enable ParallelDownloads = ... for faster download
  • Install essential packages (see CorePackages.md for more). pacstrap also have flags like -K to initialize empty pacman keyring
pacstrap /mnt base linux linux-firmware base base-devel # ...
  • Generate file system table fstab
genfstab -U /mnt >> /mnt/etc/fstab
  • Now, arch-chroot to /mnt and go to next steps!

arch-chroot and root configuration

I highly recommend install fish shell of out-of-the-box suggestions.

pacman -S fish
chsh root
# New shell: /usr/bin/fish
  • Set timezone
ln -sf /usr/share/zoneinfo/REGION/CITY /etc/localtime
  • Set system clock to hardware (or vice versa, do man hwclock)
hwclock --systohc

  • Get text editor of choice: nano, vim, neovim, etc.

  • Localization: uncomment locale in /etc/locale.gen

    • e.g.: en_CA.UTF-8, fr_CA.UTF-8
locale-gen
  • Create locale.conf to set up LANG
LANG=en_CA.UTF-8
  • Network Configuration
    • In /etc/hostname:
    myHostName
    • In /etc/hosts:
    127.0.0.1        localhost 
::1                localhost 
127.0.1.1        myHostName
  • mkinitcpio
mkinitcpio -P # using all presets, see `man mkinitcpio` for more
  • Root password using passwd
  • Add non-root user
useradd -m myUser # `-m` create a folder in /home/myUser
passwd myUser # to set password
  • Add user to access/privilege groups:
usermod -aG wheel,audio,video,optical,storage myUser

later on, groups like docker for Docker dev, or uucp for embedded (Arduino) are also required

  • Install sudo and edit visudo.
pacman -S sudo
EDITOR=nvim visudo # visudo uses vi by default, but you can specify your preferred text editor
  • Here, root user can determine how users should have access to sudo. It's good to have password whenever sudo is called, but users can opt-out
%wheel ALL = (ALL) ALL
# %wheel ALL = (ALL) NOPASSWD: ALL
  • Install GRUB and Dual-boot stuffs
pacman -S efitbootmgr os-prober grub
  • Install grub to EFI menu (boot menu) && Generate GRUB config:
grub-install --target=x86_64-efi --efi-directory=/boot --bootloader-id=GRUB –recheck
grub-mkconfig -o /boot/grub/grub.cfg
  • Exit, unmount everything, and you're done!
exit # Ctrl + D
umount -a /mnt # unmount all

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