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How to Set Up Snapper and GRUB-Btrfs for Automatic Snapshots and Rollback on Arch Linux

How to Set Up Snapper and GRUB-Btrfs for Automatic Snapshots and Rollback on Arch Linux

Installing Arch Linux gives you a solid base, but setting up Snapper and Grub-Btrfs for automatic snapshots and instant rollback turn...

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How to Set Up Snapper and GRUB-Btrfs for Automatic Snapshots and Rollback on Arch Linux

How to Set Up Snapper and GRUB-Btrfs for Automatic Snapshots and Rollback on Arch Linux

Setting Up Snapper and Grub-Btrfs on Arch Linux for Automatic Snapshots and Rollback

Installing Arch Linux gives you a solid base, but setting up Snapper and Grub-Btrfs for automatic snapshots and instant rollback turns it into a truly resilient system.

This guide is part of the MusaBase Linux Series. For a complete overview, explore our Arch Linux Roadmap.

Welcome back to MusaBase! Today we’re picking up where we left off with Installing Arch Linux with Btrfs Filesystem to set up Snapper and Grub-Btrfs on that Arch Linux system. Now, as I said in my previous guide, because Arch Linux is a rolling‑release distro, the system can break sometimes. Or, in my recent case, since I experiment a lot on my Arch system, it tends to break even more often. Sure, I could fix the breakage by hunting down and removing every trace of what broke, but I’d rather save time than repeat the same manual fixes each time. The best automated solution I’ve found is installing Arch Linux on a Btrfs filesystem and setting up Snapper for automatic snapshots and rollbacks. And in today’s guide, I’m going to show you exactly how to do the same thing on your Arch Linux system.

In this guide, you will learn how to:

  • Prepare your Arch Linux system for automatic snapshots and rollback
  • Install essential tools like snapper and grub-btrfs
  • Create a Snapper root configuration
  • Create and fix the snapshots subvolume for top‑level @ integration
  • Add a snapshots entry in /etc/fstab for automatic mounting
  • Configure Snapper for automation
  • Enable Snapper timers and GRUB snapshots integration
  • Enable the overlayfs hook to make boot snapshots writable
  • Finally, test that snapshots work by creating and rolling back to earlier points

By the end of this guide, you’ll have an Arch Linux system capable of rolling back to a point before anything went wrong. So without further ado, let’s get started!

GRUB boot menu showing Arch Linux Btrfs snapshots for one‑click rollback to pre and post states
How to Install Arch Linux with Btrfs Filesystem and Snapshot-Ready Subvolumes

How to Install Arch Linux with Btrfs Filesystem and Snapshot-Ready Subvolumes

How to install Arch Linux with Btrfs Filesystem and Rollback Features Enabled

Installing Arch Linux is only half the battle, setting it up the right way from the start is the real game. Here is how to install Arch Linux with Btrfs partitions and properly configured subvolumes for a clean, flexible, and snapshot-ready Linux system.

This guide is part of the MusaBase Linux Series. For a complete overview, explore our Arch Linux Roadmap and the Advanced Linux Distributions Guide.

Welcome back to MusaBase!. Now, in my previous Arch Linux Installation guide, I installed Arch Linux manually from scratch and set up everything on the CLI environment. But there was one thing missing. Whenever my Arch Linux system broke, and why wouldn't it? (because of "rolling release distro"). I either had to fix the problem manually or wait for the next system update to arrive and hope it wouldn't break my system further. That's when I switched to Btrfs as my filesystem of choice, and in today's guide, I'm going to show you how to install Arch Linux on a properly structured Btrfs filesystem, with subvolumes laid out and ready for snapshots and rollback in the next guide.

Let's uncover what we can do on Linux that we can't experiment with otherwise. The things that we will cover:

  • Creating storage drive partitions using cfdisk.
  • Formatting partitions for boot, swap (optional), and root (btrfs).
  • Mounting the filesystem and Btrfs subvolumes correctly in the live Arch Linux ISO environment.
  • Installing the base Arch Linux system.
  • Chrooting into the installed Arch Linux system from the live ISO.
  • Setting up the base Arch Linux system.
  • Booting into the installed Arch Linux system.
How to Install Omarchy OS: The Arch Linux Hyprland OS by DHH

How to Install Omarchy OS: The Arch Linux Hyprland OS by DHH

How to install Omarchy OS

This guide is part of the MusaBase Linux and Hyprland Series. For a complete overview, see the Best Hyprland Dotfiles Best Hyprland Dotfiles for Linux: Compared and Tested and the Arch Linux Roadmap.

Why spend hours troubleshooting configurations when you can have perfection out of the box? Omarchy OS takes the raw potential of Arch Linux and wraps it in a breathtaking Hyprland setup.

Welcome back to MusaBase! Today, I'll be installing Omarchy OS. After using Caelestia for my daily workflow over the past five months, I felt the need for something fresh with better performance. I heard about a new Hyprland-based OS trending in the Linux community, so I decided to give it a try. At first, there was a learning curve due to the different keybindings and the keyboard-centric workflow, but after using it for three weeks, Omarchy has become my go-to Linux OS. In this guide, I will show you exactly how to install it on your machine.

By the end of this article, you will have a fully functional Omarchy system running on your PC. Here is what we will cover:

  • Downloading the Omarchy ISO.
  • Creating a bootable USB with the Omarchy ISO.
  • Booting into the Omarchy Live environment.
  • Setting up the base system and installing Omarchy OS.
  • Logging into your newly installed Omarchy system.
Omarchy neofetch
MSI Afterburner Alternative on Linux: How to Overclock & Monitor AMD GPUs with CoreCtrl and MangoHud

MSI Afterburner Alternative on Linux: How to Overclock & Monitor AMD GPUs with CoreCtrl and MangoHud

 

MSI Afterburner alternate on Linux for AMD GPUs: CoreCtrl and Mangohud

MSI Afterburner is the gold standard on Windows. But on Linux, we need a different approach.

This guide is part of the MusaBase Linux Gaming series. For the complete overview, see the Linux Gaming Roadmap: Complete Guide Series.

Welcome back to MusaBase. If you have an AMD Radeon GPU and want to overclock, undervolt, or set custom fan curves on Linux, you have probably searched for an MSI Afterburner alternative. Good news. It exists. But not as a single tool.

The first time I tried to overclock my AMD GPU on Linux, I felt lost. I opened the terminal, found nothing obvious. Then I discovered CoreCtrl. A few clicks later, I was adjusting fan curves and pushing memory clocks. But CoreCtrl alone is not a complete MSI Afterburner replacement. It works only with AMD GPUs and handles hardware tuning, not in game monitoring. For that, I found MangoHud. It gives us exactly what Afterburner's on screen display does: FPS, temperatures, clock speeds, and usage while we play.

In this guide, we will learn:

  • Installing and configuring CoreCtrl for AMD GPU overclocking, undervolting, and fan curves
  • Setting up MangoHud for real time in game monitoring
  • Creating performance profiles that auto switch per application

This guide is for AMD GPU users who want full control on Linux. Just CoreCtrl for tuning and MangoHud for monitoring.

Gaming on Linux vs Windows: A Year of Gaming on Both OS

Gaming on Linux vs Windows: A Year of Gaming on Both OS

Linux vs Windows Gaming: A Year of Gaming on Both OS

This guide is part of the MusaBase Linux Gaming series. For the complete overview, see the Linux Gaming Roadmap: Complete Guide Series.

After spending a full year gaming side by side on both Linux and Windows, I finally reached my own verdict in the long-running Linux vs Windows gaming debate. Hi, my name is Abdullah Musa, and welcome to Musabase.

If you missed the setup guides, I’ve covered the essential tools in detail: Steam & Proton, Bottles, and Wine. Now, after using them for a full year, I tested everything from competitive titles to AAA games, modding, and performance tuning. Windows still dominates with native support and zero setup friction, but Linux has evolved into a serious gaming platform, offering impressive performance, better system control, and surprisingly smooth compatibility through tools like Proton and Wine.

Windows Games on Arch Linux (Part 3): Wine Setup, DXVK, Prefix & Performance

Windows Games on Arch Linux (Part 3): Wine Setup, DXVK, Prefix & Performance

Windows Games and Applications on Linux Part 3: Wine Setup Guide

This guide is part of the MusaBase Linux Gaming series. For the complete overview, see the Linux Gaming Roadmap: Complete Guide Series.

Steam and Bottles are convenient. But sometimes you want raw control.

Welcome back to MusaBase. In Part 1 of this series, I covered Steam and Proton with Proton-GE. In Part 2, I showed how to run non‑Steam games using Bottles. Both are fantastic for getting started.

Now, in Part 3, we go deeper. This guide focuses on installing and configuring Wine directly on Arch Linux, no wrappers, no abstractions. Just you, a terminal, and full control over every Windows game or application you run.

When I first ran a game with raw Wine, I was nervous. I typed the command, held my breath, and… it worked. It wasn’t pretty at first, but the feeling of understanding exactly what was happening under the hood was addictive. That’s what this guide is about: giving you that same control and understanding.

Along the way, we’ll also set up:

  • Installing Wine system‑wide with multilib support
  • Managing Wine prefixes manually and with WineGUI
  • Setting up DXVK and VKD3D for DirectX performance
  • Installing essential Windows components (VC++ runtimes, .NET, DirectX, fonts) using winetricks
  • Running games from terminal and WineGUI
  • Understanding Wine architecture and its role in Proton / Bottles

This guide is for users who want deeper system‑level control, cleaner setups, and a better understanding of how Windows compatibility works on Linux.

Windows Games on Arch Linux (Part 2): Running Non-Steam Games with Bottles (Epic, GOG, EXEs)

Windows Games on Arch Linux (Part 2): Running Non-Steam Games with Bottles (Epic, GOG, EXEs)

Windows Games on Arch Linux (Part 2): Bottles Setup for Windows Games and Application

This guide is part of the MusaBase Linux Gaming series. For the complete overview, see the Linux Gaming Roadmap: Complete Guide Series.

Your Steam library runs perfectly. But those Epic freebies? GOG classics? They’re gathering digital dust.

If you’re an Arch Linux user who wants to play everything without dual-booting, you’re in the right place.

Welcome back to MusaBase. In Part 1, we used Proton to run Steam titles. Now we move beyond Steam.

This guide shows you how to run non-Steam Windows games and applications on Linux, including Epic Games Store titles, GOG offline installers, and standalone .exe files using Bottles.

Bottles provides a clean, user-friendly way to create isolated environments for Windows games and applications on Arch Linux. It simplifies setup, configuration, and runner management so you can focus on actually playing your games.

Here’s what we’ll cover:

  • Install Bottles using Flatpak and AUR
  • Configure Bottles for gaming and application use
  • Install and launch Epic Games Store titles
  • Run standalone .exe files and already installed Windows games
  • Fix common launching and compatibility issues
Windows Games on Arch Linux (Part 1): Complete Steam and Proton Setup

Windows Games on Arch Linux (Part 1): Complete Steam and Proton Setup

How to Set Up Arch Linux for Gaming: A Comprehensive Guide

This guide is part of the MusaBase Linux Gaming series. For the complete overview, see the Linux Gaming Roadmap: Complete Guide Series.

Running Windows games on Linux is no longer experimental. With Steam and Proton, many modern Windows titles now run reliably on Linux, making it a practical gaming platform.

Welcome to MusaBase. In this first part of the Windows Games on Linux series, I show how I run Windows games on my daily-use Linux system using Steam for games and Proton for compatibility. I'm using Arch Linux btw, but you can treat it as a reference rather than a requirement.

This guide focuses on real-world setup and playability, not benchmarks or FPS chasing.

Here’s what we’ll cover:

  • Enable Multilib support on Arch Linux
  • Install Steam, Proton, and ProtonUp-Qt
  • Understand Steam vs Steam Native Runtime
  • Configure Proton properly for Windows titles
  • Use ProtonDB to improve compatibility
  • Install and test real Windows games on Linux
  • Avoid common mistakes when gaming on Linux

Series: Once Steam is set up, continue to Bottles, Wine, Settling the long-running debate: Which OS is better? Gaming on Linux vs Windows.

Windows vs Linux: A Year of Using Both Operating Systems

Windows vs Linux: A Year of Using Both Operating Systems

Windows vs Linux comparison after a year of use

After using a dual-boot setup with Linux and Windows 11 for a year, I tested both operating systems for tasks ranging from gaming to content creation, software testing, and running virtual machines. Windows excels at letting you plug-and-run anything you want, but when it comes to complex setups or technical workflows like GPU passthrough, Linux offers superior speed, flexibility, and reliability.

Windows Not Showing in GRUB on Arch Linux? Fix Dual Boot Step-by-Step

Windows Not Showing in GRUB on Arch Linux? Fix Dual Boot Step-by-Step

Windows Not Showing in GRUB on Arch Linux? Fix Dual Boot Properly

This guide is part of the MusaBase Arch Linux series. For the complete overview, see the Arch Linux Complete Guide.

If you installed Arch Linux alongside Windows and expected a clean dual boot menu, chances are you ran into a frustrating surprise. You boot your system, GRUB shows up, but Windows is missing. No option to boot into Windows, no clear error, and no explanation of what went wrong.

This is a very common issue on Arch Linux. Unlike many other distributions, Arch does not automatically detect Windows during GRUB setup. Features like os-prober are disabled by default, and if your Windows partition is not readable or mounted correctly, GRUB simply ignores it. Running grub-mkconfig alone is often not enough.

Welcome back to MusaBase!
In this guide, I will show you the proper and reliable way to fix GRUB dual boot on Arch Linux. This guide focuses on making GRUB correctly detect your existing Windows installation and keeping it stable after updates.

Here is exactly what we are going to do in this guide:

  • Install and enable os-prober on Arch Linux
  • Regenerate grub.cfg correctly for dual boot
  • Fix cases where Windows is still not detected after running grub-mkconfig
  • Install ntfs-3g to ensure the Windows partition is readable
  • Manually mount the Windows partition and re-detect it in GRUB
  • Confirm that GRUB successfully finds and adds the Windows boot entry