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Installation Preparation

The following section will guide you through the steps to prepare all the elements for installing CachyOS.

System Requirements

Before you begin the installation, you need to make sure that your computer meets the following minimum system requirements:

  • 3 GB of memory
  • 30 GB of hard disk space
  • 1 GHz processor
  • HD graphics card and monitor
  • Broadband internet connection

For the best performance, it is recommended to have:

  • 4 GB of memory
  • 50 GB of hard disk space
  • An x86-64-v3 supported processor
  • 50 Mbps or better internet connection
  • A newer NVIDIA card (900+), AMD Graphics Card or Intel

Preparing for the Installation

Before installing CachyOS on your endpoint, you need a set of tasks to prepare.

Download the Image

Download CachyOS as described in Downloading CachyOS.

Creating a Bootable CachyOS USB Drive

There are several tools that you can use to create a bootable USB drive of CachyOS. The USB drive must be atleast 8GB of size.

Balena Etcher

  1. Download Balena Etcher. Balena Etcher supports all 3 Linux, MacOS and Windows.

    If you download the .AppImage file, assign executable permission by chmod +x balenaEtcher-<version>-<arch>.AppImage and run it by ./balenaEtcher-<version>-<arch>.AppImage.

  2. Plug in your USB drive to your system.

  3. Click Flash from file and select the CachyOS ISO image file.

  4. Click Select target and choose the label of your plugged USB drive.

  5. Click Flash for starting the process.


shit

At the end of flash process you will get a Flash Completed! message. Close Balena Etcher and reboot the system for booting into CachyOS.

Command Line Interface

  1. Plug your USB drive into your available USB port.
  2. Detect the drive device label of the plugged USB drive by sudo fdisk -l (i.e., it could be /dev/sdX where X is a, b, and so on) on Linux and diskutil list on MacOS (/dev/diskY where Y is 0, 1 and so on).
  3. Run sudo dd bs=4M if=full_iso_name.iso of=/dev/<usbdrive> status=progress oflag=sync (replace <usbdrive> by the drive device label of your plugged USB drive).

dd command will now copy the contents of the ISO file over to your USB drive. Once done, you’re ready to use the USB drive as CachyOS installation media. Reboot the system to boot into CachyOS.

Rufus (Windows Only)

  1. Plug your USB drive into your available USB port.
  2. Download Rufus and install it, or run the portable version.
  3. On Device, click on the dropdown list and select your plugged USB drive.
  4. On Boot selection, click on SELECT and locate the CachyOS ISO image file.
  5. Click START.

Ventoy

  1. Plug your USB drive into your available USB port.
  2. Download Ventoy
  3. Select your USB. Ventoy will now format your USB Stick.
  4. After successful formatting you will have a Partition called “Ventoy”.
  5. The CachyOS image should be placed into the partition, the drive can then be booted from.