I happend to get a ThinkPad x240 the day before yesterday, so I want to try it.

• Arch install documentations can be found here
• Quick preview guide

Prepareation

1. download ISO file in USB flash drive

• you can find mirror site to download faster

2. make the usb dirve bootable

• download rufus

• Lenovo ThinkPad x240 uses a GUID Partition Table (GPT) scheme, especially when installed with Windows 8 or later(windows 11 in my case).

3. boot option

• I don’t want windows anymore, so for partition I will leave it for this iso.

[!NOTE] when do partition, you need to move iso file to another disk.

• Find the BIOS settings
  • how to enter BIOS for Lenovo: (F2)
  • if pc boot too quickly, you can also go to BIOS through settings -> update and recovery -> recovery -> advanced startup

• source

• disable secure boot (not need, but at least I konw hot to spin up this menu now … )

• F12 Boot Menu, source

4. Point the current boot device to the one which has the Arch Linux installation medium.

If you are lucky, you will see this

it tells me to enable UEFI boot, and after searching I realized I should enable secure boot…

After changing to secure boot, I got image failed to verify, access denied error.

Solution:

1. disable secure boot
2. ensure system is set to UEFI boot mode (not legacy/CSM)
3. check rufus settings (I did correct)

LFG!

[!NOTE] right now arch linux is still in the flash drive. Need to install on hard disk.

console keymap default keyboard layout is US, we good.

Verify the boot mode:

cat /sys/firmware/efi/fw_platform_size
# 64

• If the command returns 64, the system is booted in UEFI mode and has a 64-bit x64 UEFI.
• If the command returns 32, the system is booted in UEFI mode and has a 32-bit IA32 UEFI. While this is supported, it will limit the boot loader choice to those that support mixed mode booting.
• If it returns No such file or directory, the system may be booted in BIOS (or CSM) mode.
• If the system did not boot in the mode you desired (UEFI vs BIOS), refer to your motherboard’s manual.

update the system clock, set timezone and time.

ln -sf /usr/share/zoneinfo/PRC /etc/localtime  # or current timezone you're in

# ls /usr/share/zoneinfo to see what zone they have

set hardware clock from the system clock so that it persists across reboots

hwclock --systohc

Partition the disks

When recognized by the live system, disks are assigned to a block device such as /dev/sda, /dev/nvme0n1 or /dev/mmcblk0. To identify these devices, use lsblk or fdisk.

fdisk -l

use lsblk to find the device name of your PC’s internal drive

• These partitions (e.g., sda1, sda2, sda5, sda6, sda7) are remnants of the previous operating system installation (likely Windows, or a previous Linux setup) that was on your PC’s internal drive. Each of them served a specific purpose for that OS (e.g., system reserved, primary OS partition, recovery partition, data partitions, etc.).
• In short: These are just the existing divisions of your hard drive from its prior use. You will be wiping these away to create your new Arch Linux partitions.
• sdb is representing my flash drive, don’t mess this one.

I’m thinking about keep two partiion:

• /home for a separate partiion to keep the files safe
• / for root partition

so it will be like this:

/                             <-- Lives on /dev/sda2
├── bin
├── etc
├── usr
└── home                      <-- This directory is a mount point for /dev/sda4
    └── yourusername          <-- Contents of /dev/sda4

• /dev/sda1 (EFI System Partition - ESP): This is mandatory for UEFI booting.

• /dev/sda2 (Root Partition - /): This will contain all your Arch Linux system files.

• /dev/sda3 (Swap Partition): For virtual memory.

• /dev/sda4 (Home Partition - /home): This will hold all your personal user data, separate from the OS.

use a partitioning tool like fdisk to modify partition tables. e.g.:

fdisk /dev/the_disk_to_be_partitioned

example fdisk partition tutorial

I’m using UEFI/GPT layout, menu suggest:

Here is the step by step guide I used when do partitioning this pc:

sudo fdisk /dev/sda

• wipe the other partitions

• create a new partition

• create a 50G partition for OS

Create Partition 2: Root Partition (/ - /dev/sda2)

Press n and then Enter (to create a new partition).

Partition number: Press Enter for the default (2).

First sector: Press Enter for the default.

Last sector / Size: Type +50G (for 50 Gigabytes) and then Enter. (Adjust this size if you know you need more or less, but 50G is a solid recommendation).

Change partition type: Press t and then Enter.

    Partition number to change: Press Enter for the default (2).

    For Linux filesystem, the alias is usually 23 or 83.

    Type 23 (or 83) and then Enter.

Create Partition 3: Home Partition (/home - /dev/sda3)

Press n and then Enter.

Partition number: Press Enter for the default (3).

First sector: Press Enter for the default.

Last sector / Size: Press Enter to use the remainder of the disk for this partition.

Change partition type: Press t and then Enter.

    Partition number to change: Press Enter for the default (3).

    Type 23 (or 83) and then Enter (for Linux filesystem).

The final partitons stucutures look like this:

• type w to write table to disk and exit, apply the changes

• once the partitions has been created, each newly created partition must be formatted with an appropriate file system

Format the partition: part 1 -> Create a file system

warning:

• After creating a new file system, data previously stored on this partition can unlikely be recovered. Create a backup of any data you want to keep.
• The purpose of a given partition may restrict the choice of file system. For example, an EFI system partition must contain a FAT32 file system, and the file system containing the /boot directory must be supported by the boot loader.

Before continuing, identify the device where the file sytem will be created and whether or not it is mounted.

currently,

• loop0 is my live ISO filesystem (squashfs)
• sdb1 is my USB drive’s filesystem(vfat)
• crucially, for /dev/sda1, /dev/sda2, and dev/sda3, the FSTYPE column is completely empty, because I haven’t format them yet.

Create the FAT32 file system on /dev/sda1 (EFI System Partition):

mkfs.fat -F 32 /dev/sda1  # FAT size 32
# (This command aligns with the documentation's requirement for EFI system partitions to be FAT32.)
# mkfs.fat 4.2 (2021-01-31)

Create the Ext4 file system on /dev/sda2

mkfs.ext4 /dev/sda2
# (This is a common and robust filesystem for your main Linux system.)

Create the Ext4 file system on /dev/sda3 (your Home Partition):

mkfs.ext4 /dev/sda3
# (Ext4 is also excellent for your personal data.)

Mount a file system

So far, the operations I’ve done before all happens in USB drive, now we can finally considering move OS to the PC hard drive

Mount the root volume to /mnt, for example, if the root volume is dev/root_partition:

mount /dev/root_partition /mnt

Here are my current partitions before mount:

• Notice that the MOUNPOINT column is currently empty for sda1, sda2, sda3

Mount these newly formatted partitions.

Mount the Root Partition

• root partition: /dev/sda2

mount /dev/sda2 /mnt

Create any remaining mount points under /mnt (such as /mnt/boot for /boot) and mount the volumes in their corresponding hierarchical order.

Create the mount point for your EFI System Partition and Mount it (/dev/sda1): (This connects your EFI partition where the bootloader files will reside.)

mkdir -p /mnt/boot
mount /dev/sda1 /mnt/boot

Create the mount point for your Home Partition and Mount it (/dev/sda3): (This connects your separate home partition to its correct place in the file system hierarchy.)

sudo mkdir -p /mnt/home
sudo mount /dev/sda3 /mnt/home

System Installation

Finally bro, the next phase is to install the base Arch Linux system onto these mounted partitions.

Package manager

For the package manager I choose to use pacman because it has better integration with Arch build system. It can manage packages whether from official repositories or user’s own builds.

Edit mirrorlist

Packages to be installed must be downloaded from mirror servers, which are defined in /etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist. On the live system, after connecting to the internet, reflector updates the mirror list by choosing 20 most recently synchronized HTTPS mirrors and sorting them by download rate.

The higher a mirror is placed in the list, the more priority it is given when downloading a package. You may want to inspect the file to see if it is satisfactory. If it is not, edit the file accordingly, and move the geographically closest mirrors to the top of the list, although other criteria should be taken into account.

This file will later be copied to the new system by pacstrap, so it is worth getting right.

Install base package, Linux kernel and fimware for common hardware

Configure mirrorlist:

use reflector to update your /etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist with fast mirrors from your location

[!NOTE] Make sure this pc has internet connection!!

What you need to do now is connect your Wi-Fi to your home network using iwctl:

[!NOTE] You will only find this command when exit root mode

iwctl

scan for available networks:

station wlan0 scan

(wait a few seconds for the scan to complete. You might not see any immediate output here.)

List available networks:

station wlan0 get-networks

This will show a list of Wi-Fi networks in your area, including their SSIDs(names)

Connect to your Wi-Fi network:

Replace YOUR_SSID with the actual name of your home Wi-Fi network from the list you just saw

station wlan0 connect YOUR_SSID

• if your network has a password, it will prompt you for the passphrase. Type it carefully and press Enter.

ctrl-c or type exit to exit iwctl

reflector exmaple:

Select the HTTPS mirrors synchronized within the last 12 hours and located in either France or Germany, sort them by download speed, and overwrite the file /etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist with the results

reflector --country France,Germany --age 12 --protocol https --sort rate --save /etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist

sudo reflector --country "Your country" --protocol https --sort rate --save /etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist

pacstrap -K /mnt base linux linux-firmware

Install CPU microcode updates - amd-ucode or intel-ucode—for hardware bug and security fixes

pacstrap -K /mnt base intel-ucode

Package for accessing documentation in man and info pages:

pacstrap -K /mnt man-db man-pages texinfo

Configure the system

Fastab

The file /mnt/etc/fstab is for getting needed file systems (like the one used for the boot directory /boot) mounted on startup

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

Chroot

change root into the new system

arch-chroot /mnt

Time

set the time zone

ln -sf /usr/share/zoneinfo/PRC /etc/localtime

run hwclock(8) to generate /etc/adjtime

To prevent clock drift and ensure accurate time, set up time synchronization using a Network Time Protocol (NTP) client such as systemd-timesyncd

Localization

edit /etc/locale.gen and uncomment en_US.UTF-8 , UTF-8

side quest: install neovim

pacman -S neovim

home sweet home

create the locale.conf file , and set the LANG var accordingly:

LANG=en_US.UTF-8

Network configuration

To assign a consistent, identifiable name to your sytem (particularly useful in a networked environment), create the hostname file

/etc/hostname

yourhostname

Root password

You can setup a root password, I want to set it after complete it

passwd

Reboot

Exit the chroot environment by typing exit or pressing ctrl+d

optionally mannually unmount all the partitions with unmount -R /mnt: this allows noticing any “busy” partitions, and finding the cause with fuser

Finally, restart the machine by typing reboot