Recently I got an XPS 9360 machine from work, of course, I installed Linux. I have done this same installation (using LVM and cryptsetup to encrypt the disk) before; this time I documented it.

The way of encrypting the disk here described is also known as LUKS on LVM.

WARNING: This steps will erase the whole disk.

BIOS

This is specific for the XPS 9360. Maybe for other XPS model, it is different or at least similar; I won't be responsible for any damage in data or hardware.

Enter BIOS with F2 and configure:

  • “System Configuration” > “SATA Operation”: “AHCI”
  • “Secure Boot” > “Secure Boot Enable”: “Disabled”

Install the base system

F12 to boot from usb stick. After booting your first command are:

# setfont latarcyrheb-sun32
# wifi-menu
# timedatectl set-ntp true

Respectivaly:

  1. Set a bigger font
  2. Get online
  3. Syncronize the time of your machine

Preparing the disk

Set up the partitions:

# parted /dev/nvme0n1
(parted) mkpart primary 1 3
(parted) name 1 grub
(parted) set 1 bios_grub on
(parted) mkpart primary 3 5123
(parted) name 2 boot
(parted) set 2 boot on
(parted) mkpart primary 5123 -1
(parted) name 3 lvm
(parted) set 3 lvm on

The UEFI partition is not encrypted. Format it using FAT:

# mkfs.fat -F 32 /dev/nvme0n1p2

Encrypt the rest of the disk:

# cryptsetup luksFormat --type luks2 /dev/nvme0n1p3
# cryptsetup open /dev/nvme0n1p3 linuxdrive

Create the LVM partitions:

# pvcreate /dev/mapper/linuxdrive
# vgcreate vg1 /dev/mapper/linuxdrive
# lvcreate -L 17G -n swap vg1
# lvcreate -l 100%VG -n rootfs vg1

Create the filesystems on top of LVM:

# mkfs.ext4 /dev/vg1/rootfs
# mkswap /dev/vg1/swap

Mount the filesystems:

# mount /dev/vg1/rootfs /mnt
# mkdir /mnt/boot
# mount /dev/nvme0n1p2 /mnt/boot

Install

And finally install the base system:

# pacstrap /mnt base
# genfstab -L /mnt >> /mnt/etc/fstab

Configuring the System

Timezone:

# cd /mnt/etc
# \rm localtime
# ln -s ../usr/share/zoneinfo/Pacific/Auckland localtime

Edit /mnt/etc/locale.gen:

en_US.UTF-8 UTF-8

Execute:

# echo "LANG=en_US.UTF-8" > /mnt/etc/locale.conf

Edit /mnt/etc/vconsole.conf:

KEYMAP=us
FONT=latarcyrheb-sun32

Set hostname in /mnt/etc/hostname and /mnt/etc/hosts (Replace: <hostname>):

127.0.0.1	localhost
::1		localhost
127.0.1.1	<hostname>.localdomain <hostname>

Edit /mnt/etc/mkinitcpio.conf, for this XPS 9360 with LVM and cryptsetup:

HOOKS=(base udev autodetect consolefont keyboard keymap modconf block filesystems encrypt lvm2 resume fsck)

And run:

# arch-chroot /mnt
(chroot) # mkinitcpio -p linux
(chroot) # bootctl --path=/boot install
(chroot) # exit
#

Create the file /mnt/boot/loader/entries/arch.conf:

title Arch Linux
linux /vmlinuz-linux
initrd /initramfs-linux.img
options cryptdevice=UUID=XXXXXXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXXXXXXXXXX:linuxdrive root=/dev/mapper/vg1-rootfs quiet rw

The uuid is /dev/nvme0n1p3s. You can check it with lsblk -f.

You are now good to go :).

Don't forget:

  • Create a user for yourself, useradd myname
  • Setup a password for root, passwd
  • Install an X Window System, install gnome with: pacman -S gnome gnome-extra xorg-server-xwayland
  • You might want to install base-devel as well: pacman -S base-devel
  • You might want to install intel-ucode as well: pacman -S intel-ucode, and change /boot/loader/entries/arch.conf to this:
title Arch
linux /vmlinuz-linux
initrd /intel-ucode.img
initrd /initramfs-linux.img
options cryptdevice=UUID=15633406-666c-4654-aab2-4bac514d60ef:linuxdrive root=/dev/mapper/vg1-rootfs rw

Recover

Just in case you need to recover (I always forget to install wpa_supplicant):

# setfont latarcyrheb-sun32
# wifi-menu
# cryptsetup open /dev/nvme0n1p3 linuxdrive
# mount /dev/vg1/rootfs /mnt
# mount /dev/nvme0n1p2 /mnt/boot

Setup wifi

You can use wifi-menu to setup network after installing, just install:

# pacman -S wpa_supplicant dialog

Or copy the file from /etc/netctl/xxx. And start the network with:

# netctl start xxx

P. S.: In any case you will need pacman -S wpa_supplicant to connect.