Arch Linux Arm Multiarch Gaming

Experimental

This is an experimental setup for armhf multiarch support on Arch Linux Arm (alarm) using the ArchLinuxCN repo. Only basic programs and a few games run currently. This method still uses a 32bit environment, but only as a runtime folder for 32bit libraries since alarm isn't originally setup for multiarch. Some pacakges & PKGBUILDS are provided for easy of use, others are pulled from their repo. If you have and insight, suggestions, or scripts to make this better, please share.

This guide will require basic terminal usage.

Clone this repo to us a working directory

git clone https://github.com/Raezroth/alarm-multiarch-gaming.git /home/$USER/alarm-multiarch-gaming && cd /home/$USER/alarm-multiarch-gaming

Add ArchLinuxCN to your pacman.conf

Choose text editor: export EDITOR=vim or export EDITOR=nano

Add repo:

[archlinuxcn]
Server = https://repo.archlinuxcn.org/$arch

to your /etc/pacman.conf. sudo $EDITOR /etc/pacman.conf

Then import PGP Keys:

sudo pacman -Sy archlinuxcn-keyring

Say yes when prompted. This will fail. This is expected. Due to a developer's retirement, newly installed systems need to manually trust farseerfc's key:

sudo pacman-key --lsign-key "farseerfc@archlinux.org"

Then run sudo pacman -Sy archlinuxcn-keyring again.

Install dependacies

Use your package manager to install dependancies:

sudo pacman -S arch-install-scripts arm-linux-gnueabihf-binutils arm-linux-gnueabihf-gcc arm-linux-gnueabihf-gcc-fortran arm-linux-gnueabihf-gcc-libs arm-linux-gnueabihf-gcc-objc arm-linux-gnueabihf-glibc arm-linux-gnueabihf-linux-api-headers

Precompiled glibc 2.39 with multiarch flag enabled in Releases

mkdir pkgs && cd pkgs
wget https://github.com/Raezroth/alarm-multiarch-gaming/releases/download/000/glibc-2.39-4-aarch64.pkg.tar.xz
wget https://github.com/Raezroth/alarm-multiarch-gaming/releases/download/000/glibc-locales-2.39-4-aarch64.pkg.tar.xz
sudo pacman -U ./glibc*

Pacstrap a 32bit environment to use as a runtime: (This is for Box86 to run applicatioins beyond itself and Undertale)

Use pacstrap from arch-install-scripts to setup a 32bit runtime:

sudo pacstrap -C ./etc/pacman.conf /opt/armv7h base base-devel chromium pipewire pipewire-alsa pipewire-pulse

Use this pacstrap command to add more package/libraries to the runtime when needed later on. sudo pacstrap -C /opt/armv7h/etc/pacman.conf /opt/armv7h PACKAGES

Use can also use sudo arch-chroot /opt/armv7h/ to chroot into the runtime and manage for there with pacman

NOTE: Only append this when running software that requires 32bit libraries, DO NOT EXPORT

Add MultiArch to /etc/ld.so.conf.d/ :

sudo cp -r /home/$USER/alarm-multiarch-gaming/etc/ld.so.conf.d/* /etc/ld.so.conf.d/ && sudo ldconfig

Optional, add /usr/arm-linux-gnueabihf/bin to PATH :

export PATH=$PATH:/usr/arm-linux-gnueabihf/bin

For programs that require 32bit libgl mesa, we need to add 32bit driver to LIBGL_DRIVERS_PATH :

export LIBGL_DRIVERS_PATH=/usr/lib/dri/:/opt/dri/armv7h/usr/lib/dri/

This can be added to ~/.bashrc or .bash_profile for ease of use.

Setup Box86 & Box64

Box64 is in the ArchLinuxCN repo. sudo pacman -S box64-git

or Manually compile PKGBUILD:

git clone https://github.com/ptitSeb/box64.git /home/$USER/alarm-multiarch-gaming/box64 && cd /home/$USER/alarm-multiarch-gaming/box64/pkgbuilds && cp -r ./PKGBUILD-arm64 ./PKGBUILD && makepkg --syncdeps -i

Box86 need to manually compile PKGBUILD:

git clone https://github.com/ptitSeb/box86.git /home/$USER/alarm-multiarch-gaming/box86 && cd /home/$USER/alarm-multiarch-gaming/box86/pkgbuilds && cp -r ./PKGBUILD-arm64 ./PKGBUID && makepkg --syncdeps -i

After both are setup, run a test:

box64 --help

box86 --help

Setup Steam (BROKEN)

Manually compile modifed Steam PKGBUILD:

cd /home/$USER/alarm-multiarch-gaming/steam-arm64 && makepkg --syncdeps -i

After succesfull install:

steam

CREDITS COMING SOON