Quick Installation Checklist

This article has been created for experienced users who desire a quick, less detailed installation guide. It doubles as a checklist so essential installation steps are not forgotten.

Warning
This document is intended for experienced users only. It is not a replacement for the Gentoo Handbook and will not help you install Gentoo any faster.
Do not expect to receive any kind of support when following this checklist. Installing according to the Handbook is fully supported however.

Format drive

Note
If building within a QEMU or using a VirtIO driver, probably have to substitute the drive/partition name sda with vda throughout this article.

BIOS/MBR

Create three partitions. 128MB for /boot, 1024MB for swap, and the rest for /

root #cfdisk /dev/sda

Format the partitions:

root #mkfs.ext4 /dev/sda1

root #mkfs.ext4 /dev/sda3

root #mkswap /dev/sda2 && swapon /dev/sda2

BIOS/GPT

Create four partitions. 128MB for /boot, 2MB for BIOS Boot, 1024MB swap and the rest goes to /

root #gdisk /dev/sda

Create GPT partition table:
Command: o ↵
This option deletes all partitions and creates a new protective MBR.
Proceed? (Y/N): y ↵

Create Partition 1 (/boot):
Command: n ↵
Partition Number: 1 ↵
First sector: ↵
Last sector: +128M ↵
Hex Code: ↵

Create Partition 2 (BIOS boot):
Command: n ↵
Partition Number: 2 ↵
First sector: ↵
Last sector: +2M ↵
Hex Code: EF02 ↵

Create Partition 3 (swap):
Command: n ↵
Partition Number: 3 ↵
First sector: ↵
Last sector: +1024MB ↵
Hex Code: 8200 ↵

Create Partition 4 (/):
Command: n ↵
Partition Number: 4 ↵
First sector: ↵
Last sector: ↵ (for rest of disk)
Hex Code: ↵

Write Partition Table To Disk:
Command: w ↵
Do you want to proceed? (Y/N): Y ↵

Format the partitions:

root #mkfs.ext4 /dev/sda1

root #mkfs.ext4 /dev/sda4

root #mkswap /dev/sda3 && swapon /dev/sda3

UEFI/GPT

Create four partitions. 128MB for /boot, 128MB for UEFI ESP, 1024MB swap and the rest goes to /

root #gdisk /dev/sda

Create GPT partition table:
Command: o ↵
This option deletes all partitions and creates a new protective MBR.
Proceed? (Y/N): y ↵

Create Partition 1 (/boot):
Command: n ↵
Partition Number: 1 ↵
First sector: ↵
Last sector: +128M ↵
Hex Code: ↵

Create Partition 2 (UEFI ESP):
Command: n ↵
Partition Number: 2 ↵
First sector: ↵
Last sector: +128M ↵
Hex Code: EF00 ↵

Create Partition 3 (swap):
Command: n ↵
Partition Number: 3 ↵
First sector: ↵
Last sector: +1024MB ↵
Hex Code: 8200 ↵

Create Partition 4 (/):
Command: n ↵
Partition Number: 4 ↵
First sector: ↵
Last sector: ↵ (for rest of disk)
Hex Code: ↵

Write Partition Table To Disk:
Command: w ↵
Do you want to proceed? (Y/N): Y ↵

Format the partitions:

root #mkfs.ext4 /dev/sda1

root #mkfs.ext4 /dev/sda4

root #mkswap /dev/sda3 && swapon /dev/sda3

root #mkfs.vfat -F 32 /dev/sda2

Mount partitions

BIOS/MBR

root #mkdir -p /mnt/gentoo

root #mount /dev/sda3 /mnt/gentoo

root #mkdir /mnt/gentoo/boot

root #mount /dev/sda1 /mnt/gentoo/boot

BIOS/GPT

root #mkdir -p /mnt/gentoo

root #mount /dev/sda4 /mnt/gentoo

root #mkdir /mnt/gentoo/boot

root #mount /dev/sda1 /mnt/gentoo/boot

UEFI/GPT

root #mkdir -p /mnt/gentoo

root #mount /dev/sda4 /mnt/gentoo

root #mkdir /mnt/gentoo/boot

root #mount /dev/sda1 /mnt/gentoo/boot

root #mkdir /mnt/gentoo/boot/efi

root #mount /dev/sda2 /mnt/gentoo/boot/efi

Stage3

Find nearest mirror from this list.

Navigate to the /mnt/gentoo directory:

root #cd /mnt/gentoo

Download the stage3 tarball. Be sure to replace the keyword (amd64 and date stamp in the example below) with the correct architecture and date:

root #wget https://distfiles.gentoo.org/releases/amd64/autobuilds/current-stage3-amd64-openrc/stage3-amd64-openrc-20220320T170531Z.tar.xz

Unpack the stage3 file:

root #tar xpf stage3*

(or with xattrs):

root #tar --xattrs-include='*.*' --numeric-owner -xpf stage3*

Chroot

Chroot into the extracted stage3:

root #cd /mnt/gentoo

root #mount --types proc /proc /mnt/gentoo/proc

root #mount --rbind /sys /mnt/gentoo/sys

root #mount --make-rslave /mnt/gentoo/sys

root #mount --rbind /dev /mnt/gentoo/dev

root #mount --make-rslave /mnt/gentoo/dev

root #mount --bind /run /mnt/gentoo/run

root #mount --make-slave /mnt/gentoo/run

root #cp /etc/resolv.conf etc && chroot . /bin/bash

root #source /etc/profile

Portage

Sync the Gentoo repository:

root #emerge-webrsync

User accounts

Change the root password:

root #passwd

Create user(s):

root #useradd -g users -G wheel,portage,audio,video,usb,cdrom -m username

root #passwd username

Note
Spaces are not allowed between groups.

Configure system

Install vi (optional)

Note
vi installation is optional, you can use nano as it is a default editor in stage3.

root #emerge -vq vim

/etc/fstab

Configure /etc/fstab to match the actual partitioning performed in the step above:

FILE /etc/fstab

/dev/sda1		/boot		vfat		noauto,noatime	1 2
/dev/sda3		/		ext4		noatime		0 1
/dev/sda2		none		swap		sw		0 0
/dev/cdrom		/mnt/cdrom	auto		noauto,ro	0 0

/etc/portage/make.conf

Set preferred Portage options:

FILE /etc/portage/make.confA x86_64 make.conf example

CFLAGS="-march=native -O2 -pipe"
CXXFLAGS="${CFLAGS}"
# Do NOT change CHOST setting
CHOST="x86_64-pc-linux-gnu"

# Choose desired USE flags
USE="alsa usb"

PORTDIR="/var/db/repos/gentoo"
DISTDIR="/var/cache/distfiles"
PKGDIR="/var/cache/binpkgs"

Locale

Set system locale:

FILE /etc/env.d/02localeExample locale configuration

LANG="en_US.UTF-8"
LC_COLLATE="C"

Add the locale to /etc/locale.gen:

FILE /etc/locale.genExample locale configuration

en_US.UTF-8 UTF-8
C.UTF8 UTF-8

then generate the locale:

root #locale-gen

Hostname

Edit /etc/conf.d/hostname

FILE /etc/conf.d/netExample FQDN configuration

dns_domain_lo="mynetwork.net"

Keymap

Edit /etc/conf.d/keymaps

Clock

Edit /etc/conf.d/hwclock

Timezone

Set the appropriate timezone:

root #ln -sf /usr/share/zoneinfo/Europe/Helsinki /etc/localtime

Kernel

Emerge

The sys-kernel/gentoo-sources package is the vanilla kernel with the Gentoo patchset applied. Choose between kernel sources. The sys-kernel/linux-firmware package contains binary blobs needed for some hardware (WLAN cards).

If sys-kernel/gentoo-sources has been selected:

root #emerge -av sys-kernel/gentoo-sources sys-kernel/linux-firmware

root #cd /usr/src/linux

Configure

Manual

Install sys-apps/pciutils

root #emerge -av pciutils

Discover which modules are required for the system's hardware:

root #lspci -nnk

Shorter version:

root #lspci -nnk | grep "Kernel driver in use:"

Configure kernel by enabling each necessary module in the menuconfig interface. Search for specific module names by pressing / in menuconfig. Navigate to the associated feature by pressing the corresponding number listed on the left of the search results.

root #make menuconfig

Once finished build kernel and modules:

root #make -j2

Automatic

If things are working nicely in the current install environment, it is possible to use localyesconfig to select all modules currently loaded by the LiveCD:

root #make localyesconfig

Build the kernel and modules:

root #make -j2

Install

Install the kernel and modules:

root #make modules_install

root #make install

Bootloader

Specify the correct setting for the system's firmware. BIOS/MBR is pc, 64-bit UEFI is efi-64, 32-bit UEFI is efi-32:

Note
32-bit UEFI is rare to find on PCs. Mostly older Apple hardware use this. It has nothing to do with the Gentoo architecture chosen.

FILE /etc/portage/make.confPC BIOS settings for GRUB

GRUB_PLATFORMS="pc"

FILE /etc/portage/make.conf64-bit UEFI settings for GRUB

GRUB_PLATFORMS="efi-64"

Emerge GRUB:

root #emerge --ask sys-boot/grub

• Supposing the system has PC BIOS:

root #grub-install /dev/sda

• Supposing the system has UEFI firmware and the EFI partition is mounted in the /boot/efi directory:

root #grub-install --target=x86_64-efi --efi-directory=/boot/efi

• Edit GRUB's configuration file:

root #nano /boot/grub/grub.cfg

Below is a simple GRUB configuration file:

FILE /boot/grub/grub.cfgExample manual config

set default=0
set timeout=1

menuentry "Gentoo" {
linux (hd0,1)/vmlinuz-3.14.4-gentoo root=/dev/sda3 rootfstype=ext4 net.ifnames=0 quiet ro
}

Alternatively use the grub-mkconfig command to generate the configuration file::

root #grub-mkconfig -o /boot/grub/grub.cfg

Found vmlinuz-3.14.4-gentoo

Network tools

Install tools needed for configuring the network interfaces:

root #emerge --ask sys-apps/iproute2 net-misc/dhcpcd net-wireless/wireless-tools net-wireless/iw net-wireless/wpa_supplicant

Clean up

Exit chroot, unmount partitions, and reboot:

root #exit

root #cd /mnt

root #umount -R gentoo

root #reboot

See also

• Gentoo Handbook — an effort to centralize essential documentation for initial Gentoo installation and basic system administration.
• Installation — an overview of the principles and practices of installing Gentoo on a running system.