Part of CachyOS Wiki Notes. From the official CachyOS wiki (last updated 2025-12-03).

Preparing a CachyOS USB Installer

Before you start

• Installation is online only — a stable, reasonably fast internet connection is mandatory. Unstable internet means long install times or outright failure.
• Not recommended in a VM (broken/incorrect config is possible); bare metal is recommended.
• Minimum: 3 GB RAM, 30 GB storage, stable internet.
• USB drive: at least 8 GB free.
• Keep a copy of the ISO on the drive (or elsewhere) for later troubleshooting via chroot.

x86-64 microarchitecture levels

• x86-64-v3 — AMD Family 15h (Excavator), 17h (Zen/Zen+/Zen 2), 19h (Zen 3); Intel 4th Gen (Haswell) through 10th Gen (Comet Lake), and 12th–15th Gen (Alder/Raptor/Raptor Refresh/Lunar/Arrow Lake).
• x86-64-v4 — AMD 19h (Zen 4/Zen 4c), 1Ah (Zen 5/Zen 5c); Intel Skylake X, Cannon Lake, Ice/Cascade/Cooper Lake, Tiger/Sapphire/Emerald Rapids, Rocket Lake.

Relevant to Optimized Repositories and x86-64 Levels.

Writing the USB

balenaEtcher (Linux/macOS/Windows)

# Extract zip file:
bsdtar xvf <zip file name>
# cd to the new folder:
cd balenaEtcher-linux-x64/
# Execute balenaEtcher:
./balena-etcher

CLI (Linux & macOS)

Identify the drive first:

# Linux — the USB drive could be e.g. /dev/sda, by disk model and size
sudo fdisk -l
 
# macOS — USB drives are identified as /dev/diskN where N is 0,1,...
diskutil list

Then write it (replace <usbdrive> with the drive label):

sudo dd bs=4M if=full_iso_name.iso of=/dev/<usbdrive> status=progress oflag=sync

Rufus (Windows only)

Device -> Boot selection -> SELECT ISO -> START.

Ventoy (Linux & Windows)

# Replace version with the correct one, e.g. ventoy-1.1.07-linux.tar.gz
bsdtar xvf ventoy-version-linux.tar.gz
# cd to the new folder (version might change)
cd ventoy-1.1.07/

# It will ask for administrative privileges
./VentoyGUI.x86_64

Then place the ISO into the new usable partition of the drive.

Next: Installing CachyOS on a Desktop or Laptop.