Setup NOOBS
This article aims to walk through the installation process as defined for NOOBS version 1.3.2 (Nov 2013). The official documentation can be found here. [1]
Contents
What is NOOBS
NOOBS is the Raspberry Pi Foundations own simple Operating System installation software for the Raspberry Pi. It's called 'New Out Of Box Software' (NOOBS) [2]
The NOOBS system aims to reduce the complexity of installation by providing the user a simpler method of copying the operating system the RPi SD card and to allow multiple operating systems to be installed on the same SD card (subject to capacity).
Download the NOOBS ZIP File
The RPi Foundation maintains numerous ways of obtaining the NOOBS installation package. [3]. Whichever way you download NOOBS you end up with a single zip file like 'NOOBS_v1_3_2.zip'.
Format your SD card
There areseveral ways of doing this depending on the operating system of the computer you have available.
Windows
Download and install the SD Association's Formatting tool from [4]. Install the tools and Open the Application. Simple follow the oline instructions.
Linux GUI
If you're using a flavour of Linux with a user interface it is recommended to use 'gparted'.
Raspberry Pi or Linux Command Line
The following describes each step.
sudo fdisk -cu /dev/sdc
Command (m for help): p Disk /dev/sdc: 7822 MB, 7822376960 bytes 241 heads, 62 sectors/track, 1022 cylinders, total 15278080 sectors Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes Disk identifier: 0x000e7b31 Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System /dev/sdc1 8192 122879 57344 c W95 FAT32 (LBA) /dev/sdc2 122880 15278079 7577600 83 Linux
The example SD card has an existing installation, delete the partitions using:
Command (m for help): d Partition number (1-4): 1 Command (m for help): d Selected partition 2 Command (m for help):
Add a new partion and set the type to FAT32
Command (m for help): n Command action e extended p primary partition (1-4) p Partition number (1-4): 1 First sector (2048-15278079, default 2048): Using default value 2048 Last sector, +sectors or +size{K,M,G} (2048-15278079, default 15278079): Using default value 15278079
Change the partion type
Command (m for help): p Disk /dev/sdc: 7822 MB, 7822376960 bytes 241 heads, 62 sectors/track, 1022 cylinders, total 15278080 sectors Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes Disk identifier: 0x000c7b31 Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System /dev/sdc1 2048 15278079 7638016 83 Linux Command (m for help): t Selected partition 1 Hex code (type L to list codes): L 0 Empty 24 NEC DOS 81 Minix / old Lin bf Solaris 1 FAT12 39 Plan 9 82 Linux swap / So c1 DRDOS/sec (FAT- 2 XENIX root 3c PartitionMagic 83 Linux c4 DRDOS/sec (FAT- 3 XENIX usr 40 Venix 80286 84 OS/2 hidden C: c6 DRDOS/sec (FAT- 4 FAT16 <32M 41 PPC PReP Boot 85 Linux extended c7 Syrinx 5 Extended 42 SFS 86 NTFS volume set da Non-FS data 6 FAT16 4d QNX4.x 87 NTFS volume set db CP/M / CTOS / . 7 HPFS/NTFS 4e QNX4.x 2nd part 88 Linux plaintext de Dell Utility 8 AIX 4f QNX4.x 3rd part 8e Linux LVM df BootIt 9 AIX bootable 50 OnTrack DM 93 Amoeba e1 DOS access a OS/2 Boot Manag 51 OnTrack DM6 Aux 94 Amoeba BBT e3 DOS R/O b W95 FAT32 52 CP/M 9f BSD/OS e4 SpeedStor c W95 FAT32 (LBA) 53 OnTrack DM6 Aux a0 IBM Thinkpad hi eb BeOS fs e W95 FAT16 (LBA) 54 OnTrackDM6 a5 FreeBSD ee GPT f W95 Ext'd (LBA) 55 EZ-Drive a6 OpenBSD ef EFI (FAT-12/16/ 10 OPUS 56 Golden Bow a7 NeXTSTEP f0 Linux/PA-RISC b 11 Hidden FAT12 5c Priam Edisk a8 Darwin UFS f1 SpeedStor 12 Compaq diagnost 61 SpeedStor a9 NetBSD f4 SpeedStor 14 Hidden FAT16 <3 63 GNU HURD or Sys ab Darwin boot f2 DOS secondary 16 Hidden FAT16 64 Novell Netware af HFS / HFS+ fb VMware VMFS 17 Hidden HPFS/NTF 65 Novell Netware b7 BSDI fs fc VMware VMKCORE 18 AST SmartSleep 70 DiskSecure Mult b8 BSDI swap fd Linux raid auto 1b Hidden W95 FAT3 75 PC/IX bb Boot Wizard hid fe LANstep 1c Hidden W95 FAT3 80 Old Minix be Solaris boot ff BBT 1e Hidden W95 FAT1 Hex code (type L to list codes): c Changed system type of partition 1 to c (W95 FAT32 (LBA)) Command (m for help): p Disk /dev/sdc: 7822 MB, 7822376960 bytes 241 heads, 62 sectors/track, 1022 cylinders, total 15278080 sectors Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes Disk identifier: 0x000c7b31 Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System /dev/sdc1 2048 15278079 7638016 c W95 FAT32 (LBA)
Write the changes and exist
Command (m for help): w The partition table has been altered! Calling ioctl() to re-read partition table. WARNING: If you have created or modified any DOS 6.x partitions, please see the fdisk manual page for additional information. Syncing disks.
Format the partition
sudo mkfs.vfat /dev/sdc1
Copy contents of the NOOBS zip
Linux
Copy and extract the files to your SD Card, note the device can be found using the df -h
command one the SD card is re-inserted to the host machine and auto mounted.
unzip NOOBS_v1_3_2.zip -d /media/3D4D-A03B/
Unmount the SD card
sudo umount /media/3D4D-A03B/
Install the SD card in your RPi SD Card slot, make sure your Pi si connected to a monitor. mouse and keyboard.
NOOBS First Boot
Power up your RPi and you'll be presented with a screen image on your monitor or TV that shows it formatting the spare space on your SD card then showing the OS selection prompt / screen.
Select the Operating System of your choice (here we select the recommended Raspian).
Wait whilst the NOOBS installer overwrites the SD card. Approximately 2GB of data (@NOOBS 1.3.2) is required, on my system the write speed is ~1MB/s, the installation requires about 3minutes.
If you are new to the RPI its worth watching the screen shots during installation as they offer a wealth of useful info.
Click OK once the installation prompt appears and the RPi will reboot.
Post installation set-up
On first boot the NOOBS installation of Raspian will show the installation helper raspi-config which allow location and many other features to be defined.
Consult the official documentation for the many options available. The minimum is to set your language,location,timezone and keyboard.
Remember the default user is 'pi' and the username is 'raspberry'.
Updates
Optionally after intial set-up its recommended that the user update their operating system, this is easily achieved using the command line interface using
sudo apt-get update sudo apt-get -y upgrade sudo /usr/bin/rpi-update sudo apt-get clean
The sequence of commands can be executed is series using
sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get -y upgrade && sudo /usr/bin/rpi-update && sudo apt-get clean
Depending on how many changes there are, updating can take a long time, please be patient.