My personal Arch-diary

khalderon · 2008-01-06 16:51:59

Wish me luck, because I am going to install Arch on my laptop! I will use this thread to post my experience and eventually inform you of my personal impressions. I just hope there won't be too many issues, and I will finish the first part (Installation of kernel) and setup a dual-boot system with Windows Vista!

Btw, I am a Linux newbie, but I am willing to learn!

peets · 2008-01-07 05:58:27

Good luck! The Beginner's Guide found on the wiki may help.

khalderon · 2008-01-07 06:23:21

Sadly, I had a horrible experience with it. After reboot, there was no GRUB, but the terrible message: "no bootable device -- insert boot disk and press any key".
It seems that Arch is not compatible at all with my laptop. Do I now have to give up? I already reinstalled Vista.

jubstuff · 2008-01-07 09:20:48

Zdravko wrote:

Btw, I am a Linux newbie, but I am willing to learn!

Seems like you weren't..:rolleyes:
I think you can do better...try being more specific about your laptop and your problems during installation...maybe someone can help you

khalderon · 2008-01-07 09:39:57

My laptop is here: http://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=41782
The hdd had initially 55 GB with Vista and the rest (~25 GB) unpartitioned.
The installation routine went relatively fine, without much problems. I followed the articles in the wiki for dual boot Arch with Windows.
Using the installation I added 2 more primary partitions: sda1, sda2 - swap and /, respectively. I explicitly chose to install GRUB in the / and not in MBR.
Reboot and then - no bootable device -- insert boot disk and press any key.
I really do hope someone can help me! I still have the Arch CD and may give it again a try some day in the future. If only I could make it dual-boot with Vista!

Weteor · 2008-01-07 09:55:55

Zdravko wrote:

My laptop is here: http://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=41782
Using the installation I added 2 more primary partitions: sda1, sda2 - swap and /, respectively. I explicitly chose to install GRUB in the / and not in MBR.(

I think that is your problem. I may be wrong, but If you put Grub in / you have to use a boot disk. Put it in the MBR and you should be fine.

khalderon · 2008-01-07 10:02:40

I think you are wrong. The wiki recommends installing GRUB NOT in the MBR.
I read: http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Win … _Dual_Boot and that: http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Off … Bootloader

Weteor · 2008-01-07 10:46:40

I think there is a misunderstanding. If you don't want to install Grub in the MBR you have to configure the bootloader currently in the MBR (that should be the Microsoft one) to start Arch ( see "Other Options" in http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Win … Dual_Boot) or use a grub boot disk. The other option is to install grub in the MBR and let it start Arch or Windows (which works flawless for me).

I also can't find where it is said that you should not install Grub in the MBR. It is only said that "it might be a better option to install the bootloader in your root or /boot partition, and refer to that boot sector from whatever other boot loader you want to reside in the master boot record."

khalderon · 2008-01-07 10:58:41

Ahaa. Yes. It is a pure misunderstanding. This issue must be clarified in the wiki.
Let's sum it up: if you don't have a /boot partition and you want to dual-boot with the already installed (and "windowed" MBR) Vista, then GRUB must be installed right into MBR!

Is this right? Any volunteer to test it? I won't be that guy! I want to be 100% sure first.

xdeusx · 2008-01-07 11:09:26

yeah that's the way...

Weteor · 2008-01-07 11:21:19

I think it is irrelevant if you have a /boot partition or not. I don't have one, /boot is just a directory under /.
You always have two choices:

1. Install grub to / and use the existing bootloader in the MBR to start grub/Arch (which is a bit difficult with the Vista one)

2. Install grub to the MBR (grub replaces the exitsting bootloader) and use grub to start Arch and Vista. (Just be sure your /boot/grub/menu.lst is configured correctly)

And I use Grub in the MBR to start Arch and XP

khalderon · 2008-01-07 13:28:55

Okay, this sounds encouraging, but I need at least one person to have succeeded with Vista.

jacko · 2008-01-07 15:41:58

this is too funny...

after u install grub as the instructions say to the MBR, a file named menu.lst will be placed in /boot/grub. U need edit this file one time and uncomment the lines to allow it to see the windows partition. so you take what I have below and remove the '#' from the last 4 lines. and alter the (hd0,0) line to point to the partition of windows. But, I do not think u will need to change this since windows is the first partition on the only drive u have in the laptop, that makes it (hd0,0). U will instead need to alter the arch entry to reflect where arch is installed. I am betting this will be (hd0,1) since the root '/' partition is gonna be the second partition on the drive. Remember, u have to start counting at 0.

# (0) Arch Linux
title Arch Linux [/boot/vmlinuz26]
root (hd0,0)
kernel /boot/vmlinuz26 root=/dev/sda1 ro vga=773
initrd /boot/kernel26.img
# (1) Windows
#title Windows
#rootnoverify (hd0,0)
#makeactive
#chainloader +1

it will look like this...

# (0) Arch Linux
title Arch Linux [/boot/vmlinuz26]
root (hd0,1)
kernel /boot/vmlinuz26 root=/dev/sda2 ro vga=773
initrd /boot/kernel26.img
# (1) Windows
title Windows
rootnoverify (hd0,0)
makeactive
chainloader +1

the bold lines are the ones I altered. Even if arch doesn't install properly and won't boot, u can still use grub to boot windows without re-installing windows vista. U took the long route...

Last edited by jacko (2008-01-07 15:54:05)

jacko · 2008-01-07 16:03:52

I will explain a little more in depth.

(hd0,0) <--- these numbers point to the physical HD u have in your machine and the partition on that HD.

The first number (hd0,0) points to the HD, if u have multiple HD's then this number will change accordingly to which HD u want to point to. IE...
I have two HD's in my PC, so the first number will either a zero (0) or a one (1). If I choose 1 (hd,1,0) then I am pointing grub to the second HD that is connected to my pc.

the second number (hd0,0) is the partition on the HD u pointed to in the first number. Again, u have to start counting at zero (0)

So in your computer u have one HD, that makes it easy, the first number will always be zero (0), but its the second number that is important to you. U have a windows partition, a linux partition, and a swap partition.

Windows will be the first partition sda1 (hd0,0), since u installed windows before arch, arch's root partition will be the second partition sda2 (hd0,1) on the HD, and finally your swap will be third partition sda3 <-- grub does not care about swap, that is initiated when the kernel loads.

Does any of that clear things up? Does my first post make more sense now?

Last edited by jacko (2008-01-07 16:06:15)

khalderon · 2008-01-07 17:10:52

Mm, yes. I will try one more time.

Zer0 · 2008-01-07 17:48:20

Just to clarify what the MBR is as when I first dove into Linux I was totally lost.. I have the perfect analogy..

Think of your Hard drive as a Book..
Partitions are the chapters in the book..
MBR is the Table of Contents at the front of the book to list/find the chapters..

MBR is where the system looks on the drive to find out what chapter to start on (aka what to boot).

So... if you install grub in the MBR the computer will load grub.
If you install grub in the / or somewhere else the computer needs to know to look there for the Table of Contents instead of the usual MBR.
As a newer user to Linux.. most likely you want to install grub to the MBR which is pretty standard.

Grub will then become your "Table of Contents" handler and you may have to add Vista to this "Table of Contents" manually (which isn't difficult and jacko has already provided you with a head start).

khalderon · 2008-01-07 18:25:59

Many thanks to all of you! You were extremely helpful these days! Finally I got it!
This time the cfdisk utility didn't allow me to set bootable flag to /, so I toggled it.
The fstab looked like that:
/dev/sda2 / ext3 defaults 0 1

During installation, I switched to vc12 from time to time. There I could see this:
(none) APIC error on CPU0: 40 (40)
Dunno, whether it is important or not.

During the configuration step I noticed the MODULES array in rc.conf is too large:
MODULES = (tg3 bcm43xx snd-mixer-oss snd-pcm-oss snd-hwdep snd-page-alloc snd-pcm snd-timer snd snd-hda-intel soundcore)

Now that was a big enumeration! Since I want to know everything about my Arch system, I need to know each of these modules and disable them, if they are not needed. The second module must be the one that controls the ethernet card (it is a BroadCom one), I guess. The following modules are somehow to sound connected, however, I don't need sound at this moment.

After reboot, a simple, yet elegant GRUB menu appeared with 3 possibilities: Arch, Arch failure, Windows (or something like that). I have already configured menu.lst to default to Windows after 5 seconds of time-out. So far - so good!

Booting into Windows works like charm!

However, when I choose Arch, an awful amount of text messages appears so fast, that I cannot read it. After a few seconds begins a listing of starting modules (???) with [OK] or [BUSY] result at the right. Finally, I end up with vc1, where I am asked to login as root into "myhost" (???). Intuitively, I wrote 'root' and hit Enter. This seemed to work and I was in! Hurray!!!

I decided to run a 'ls', just to see where I am. No output.
Then I decided to check network connectivity: ping -c 3 google.com
can't find host google.com...
W00t? But there was a module for the ethernet card in the MODULES array, right?

Could someone enlighten me about how to set a root password, fine tune the system, just before going to the next step (install X).

rson451 · 2008-01-07 18:46:26

the text that appears is just the boot up process that arch has. when you login and do "ls" chances are there are no files in the "/root" directory where you are. try "cd /" then "ls". to set root's password login and type "passwd" and you will be prompted for a new password. the "myhost" you saw is the hostname which you have set in your /etc/rc.conf file. from here i suggest creating a user -- do not keep using root for everything. once you've got a normal user i'd look into why your network isn't working right.

hacosta · 2008-01-07 19:43:33

the rc.conf section in the beginners guide might be handy

jacko · 2008-01-07 21:18:12

http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Beg … cessary.29

u did a

ping -c 3 google.com

should be

ping -c 3 www.google.com

But, that may not be your problem, how are u hooking to the net? is it a wired connection or a wireless connection? Quite honestly if I had to choose for now, go wired, its easier to setup arch if u have a wired connection and use dhcp.

W00t? But there was a module for the ethernet card in the MODULES array, right?

yes, there was one meaning the kernel found your hardware, that's a good sign, and means it is being loaded at boot up.

^^^^^ read the wiki, link above, it is your friend. Many of noobs have tried before u and many, like me, have found the wiki to be the best resource for people just starting out.

Last edited by jacko (2008-01-07 21:20:26)

khalderon · 2008-01-08 08:00:37

I managed to password-protect the root account. I also added another user via the adduser script. However, running

passwd -S -a

showed me there are other users already: root, bin, daemon, mail, ftp, nobody. Is this normal? Can I safely delete them?
I also don't know how to log out from the current account. The only thing I new from the manual, was to run a reboot command. Both /root and /home/zdravko seemed to be empty, and this explained why 'ls' didn't list anything initially.
I also noticed the '~' sign in the shell:

[root@myhost ~]:

The tilda must have shown I am located in my own directory after the login.
If it was:

[zdravko@myhost ~]:

this could mean I am in /home/zdravko, right?

The only way to quit a manpage is Ctrl+Z, right?

Even with www.google.com, I got:

ping: unknown host www.google.com

Btw, the DEAMONS list is:

DEAMONS = (syslog-ng network netfs crond)

I can even see the start/stop of the network during start/restart.

tomk · 2008-01-08 09:45:28

Zdravko - I've moved this to Newbie Corner, where the kind of questions you are asking are more likely to be answered. The answers are also available in man pages or online, if you are prepared to do some reading and learning.

PJ · 2008-01-08 10:57:32

Zdravko wrote:

I managed to password-protect the root account. I also added another user via the adduser script. However, running
passwd -S -a
showed me there are other users already: root, bin, daemon, mail, ftp, nobody. Is this normal? Can I safely delete them?

Yes, it's normal. Those are not real user accounts (except root), more like accounts that are used by various daemons and for setting different statuses in the file system.

Zdravko wrote:

I also don't know how to log out from the current account.

You can use one of the following commands: logout, exit
Another way to exit is to use the following keychain: ctrl-d
I prefer the last one.

Zdravko wrote:

I also noticed the '~' sign in the shell:
[root@myhost ~]:
The tilda must have shown I am located in my own directory after the login.

Yes, that's correct. It could be used in paths to, the following command will take you back to your home directory: cd ~

Zdravko wrote:

If it was:
[zdravko@myhost ~]:
this could mean I am in /home/zdravko, right?

To see where you currently are you can use: pwd

The path for the home directory doesn't always have to follow that specific pattern. It could for example be made into a hierarchical tree where the paths to the users home directory where made like this: /home/department/username

The only way to quit a manpage is Ctrl+Z, right?

I usually use 'q' for that.

For the network stuff: You need to specify a bit more how you have configure your network, like if you are using dhcp or a static IP, if you have enter at least one IP for dns (needed if you are using static IP), otherwise we can't help you.

khalderon · 2008-01-08 12:47:35

Thanks, PJ! I am starting to understand Arch. I remember trying to 'reboot' from my non-root user, but I got the error, it doesn't have the privileges to do so. After a few minutes spent in manpages, I stumbled upon the command 'su'. I did:

su -c reboot root

in order to reboot successfully.
I have a wired connection - a BroadCom Lan Ethernet card, which is connected via a cable to a router. Since under Windows the connection is set to automatically get IP etc, I assume it uses DHCP authentication.

After reading some articles in the wiki, I realized I need the package dhcpcd(base). It must be located on the Arch CD. Somehow, I have to mount the CD, tell pacman to look for packages in there, and then run something like:

pacman -S dhcpcd

Then, according to the manual, I must edit rc.conf with eth0 = ("dhcp"). In my case I will insert the string on first place, since eth0 has a lot of options already. Then I must run

dhcpcd eth0

and hope (after reboot ?) everything will be fine!

Btw, what internet browser would you recommend me to use in the CLI? I don't want to constantly reboot and switch back to that awful slow Windows

rson451 · 2008-01-08 13:00:48

to exit out of a man page, use "q". ^Z only pauses (suspends) the process. as for your dhcp setup, you should not need to install that package, it should be installed for you. just set your eth0="dhcp". there may be a few other lines in rc.conf that you need to tweak like your default gateway and such to get it working right.

Arch Linux

#1 2008-01-06 16:51:59

My personal Arch-diary

#2 2008-01-07 05:58:27

Re: My personal Arch-diary

#3 2008-01-07 06:23:21

Re: My personal Arch-diary

#4 2008-01-07 09:20:48

Re: My personal Arch-diary

#5 2008-01-07 09:39:57

Re: My personal Arch-diary

#6 2008-01-07 09:55:55

Re: My personal Arch-diary

#7 2008-01-07 10:02:40

Re: My personal Arch-diary

#8 2008-01-07 10:46:40

Re: My personal Arch-diary

#9 2008-01-07 10:58:41

Re: My personal Arch-diary

#10 2008-01-07 11:09:26

Re: My personal Arch-diary

#11 2008-01-07 11:21:19

Re: My personal Arch-diary

#12 2008-01-07 13:28:55

Re: My personal Arch-diary

#13 2008-01-07 15:41:58

Re: My personal Arch-diary

#14 2008-01-07 16:03:52

Re: My personal Arch-diary

#15 2008-01-07 17:10:52

Re: My personal Arch-diary

#16 2008-01-07 17:48:20

Re: My personal Arch-diary

#17 2008-01-07 18:25:59

Re: My personal Arch-diary

#18 2008-01-07 18:46:26

Re: My personal Arch-diary

#19 2008-01-07 19:43:33

Re: My personal Arch-diary

#20 2008-01-07 21:18:12

Re: My personal Arch-diary

#21 2008-01-08 08:00:37

Re: My personal Arch-diary

#22 2008-01-08 09:45:28

Re: My personal Arch-diary

#23 2008-01-08 10:57:32

Re: My personal Arch-diary

#24 2008-01-08 12:47:35

Re: My personal Arch-diary

#25 2008-01-08 13:00:48

Re: My personal Arch-diary

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