Arch Linux

parth105

Member

Registered: 2013-04-20

Posts: 12

live usb and grub queries

I have a dual boot machine between Win7 and LinuxMint and want to give Arch a shot, I feel I have enough linux usage behind me to take on this..

So the roadblock I hit is creating a live USB. I downloaded the latest arch iso image.

I unmounted the usb that I was trying to make bootable, and ran this command

sudo dd if=(source location) of=/dev/sdb

Now at the end it did show the result as the files being transferred or as the operation being complete. But the USB is rendered useless and unbootable, Linux could not even mount it. Gparted shows an error and I had to reformat it.

So I tried Unetbootin from windows, which managed to create a bootable USB.

After booting from this USB, I was greeted with a screen with two options:

Default
loadconfig

instead of the familiar ArchLinux boot screen that I was expecting with the info I have gathered from the internet..

Selecting either options shows a prompt

[rootfs /]#

Please guide me hereon..

Another but related query, I am assuming that if I don't install the grub at the end of Arch installation, it will work as I can go to linux mint and run:

update-grub

Thanks, appreciate it.

Last edited by parth105 (2013-04-20 22:42:19)

parth105

Member

Registered: 2013-04-20

Posts: 12

Re: live usb and grub queries

I actually happened to overlook the Unetbootin part in the guide here: https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/US … tion_Media  to modify the sysconfig.cfg

But

The tutorial says to replace the X here "archisodevice=/dev/sdX1 ../../" with the first free letter in the system.

Now since 'a' is reserved for the existing partitions on my system..I tried 'b'.

But it turns out that 'sdb' worked, sdb1 did not as mentioned in there..

Last edited by parth105 (2013-04-20 23:12:34)

parth105

Member

Registered: 2013-04-20

Posts: 12

Re: live usb and grub queries

But now I have hit another roadblock now. The AP that I am trying to connect has a wpa connection. It requires me to enter a username and password in order to connect to the network..
I am not sure where to enter this information while editing the /etc/wpa_supplicant/wpa_supplicant.conf..

any ideas

Trilby

Inspector Parrot

Registered: 2011-11-29

Posts: 29,523

Website

Re: live usb and grub queries

This has become a very schizophrenic thread: the problem you are working on now has no connection to the thread title.  Each thread should focus on one problem.

For the wireless issue, be sure to follow the wireless page on the wiki.  The arch wiki solved your first problem, it will also solve your second.  Always check there first - and check other resources.  If/when those resources fail, start a new thread here with a title representing the problem.

---

"UNIX is simple and coherent..." - Dennis Ritchie, "GNU's Not UNIX" -  Richard Stallman

parth105

Member

Registered: 2013-04-20

Posts: 12

Re: live usb and grub queries

I agree. I can stop ranting further about my installation roadblocks. My apologies @Trilby..

But let me keep this thread open as I still want to know:
1) Why did the USB not work with the dd command
2) will the update-grub work from linux mint

teateawhy

Member

From: GER

Registered: 2012-03-05

Posts: 1,138

Website

Re: live usb and grub queries

2) Maybe. This command does not exist in archlinux, and the correct way to generate a grub config file is using grub-mkconfig from within the archlinux chroot.

parth105

Member

Registered: 2013-04-20

Posts: 12

Re: live usb and grub queries

Well the update-grub method did work. So I now have a working Arch linux running on my machine..