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Arch linux

Arch is just a better distro, but using arch doesnt instantly make you a better linux user. Saying "I am a arch user btw" is still fun and annoys people so I keep saying it reguardless.

Warning: This is a ever changing page due to the fact I havent been daily driving arch for long as of writing this and is uncompletish.

Installing arch

A lot of arch users will get pissed as fuck at me but its ok to use arch install. I personally prefer manually installing arch and wouldnt want to do it any other way so I dont use it, btw (:

The offical arch installation guide and other resources on the arch wiki is a great way to install arch though I also like to use distro tubes arch installation guide alongside the resources. Some arch users may be pissed I dare tell people to go watch a youtube video. I am sure most arch installation guides on youtube suck but DT's video is killer. Plus its not a replacement for the wiki, its just to help follow it a bit easier and act as a good jumping off point.

Some things I gotta add is for me DT's video I linked doesnt work 100 percent. When setting up grub it cant find the efi directory. You gotta use a switch to show that command that fails the efi directory. I forgor the switch and I am too lazy to look it up but you can find it if the --help flag. Also to dual boot with nasty nasty MS Windows(R) you gotta install ntfs-3g for it to be able to read MS Windows(R) ntfs(R) Microsoft(R) partitions. You also gotta set GRUB_DISABLE_OS_PROBER=false in /etc/default/grub and mount the MS Windows(R) directory in the efi directory for OS proper to work sometimes.

After installing

Make sure you install a good ass DE or WM. No better DE than good old trusty xfce. Your also going to want lightdm with that. Thunar is a quite useable file manager though you can betterize it with gvfs or another opinional packages for cool fancy shit. Or for even more cool fancy things get something like spaceFM. Just fuck around tbh.

If your sound fucking aint working right install sof-firmware.

Nvidia drivers

A lot can change depending on many things and everything I say has only been tested on my machine so read some fucking resources here:

Guide for my system mostly and maybe yours:
  • Install some packages:
    sudo pacman -Syu
    sudo pacman -S nvidia nvidia-utils nvidia-settings
  • Rebuild the initramfs:
    sudo mkinitcpio -P
  • Follow a guide found here to setup lightdm for nvidia.
  • Open up the xfce startup app thingy and add nvidia-settings --load-config-only as a startup app so your nvidia settings load on login.
  • After reboot you can check the drivers with:
    • My prefered way:
      sudo pacman -S mesa-utils
      glxinfo | grep -E "OpenGL vendor|OpenGL renderer"
    • Another way: nvidia-smi
  • For multi monitor refresh rate issues add these to your /etc/environment
    CLUTTER_DEFAULT_FPS=<refresh rate of your sync monitor>
    __GL_SYNC_DISPLAY_DEVICE=<monitor to sync to>
    Then open your nvidia settings, go to OpenGL Settings and turn off "Allow Flipping".