Install Video Drivers on Arch Linux
Video drivers can be sometimes be a headache to configure on Linux. Proprietary drivers can be installed from AUR but are often even more troublesome. For this reason open source drivers should be a first choice especially since most hardware will see similar performance levels as closed source drivers. If all else fails default drivers can be installed which works with most hardware. It is good to have as a fallback driver but not recommended as a primary driver as it does not support hardware acceleration. In addition installing multilib drivers allows installing and running 32-bit applications like Steam on 64-bit operating systems.
Install Fallback Video Drivers
Install default drivers.
sudo pacman -S xf86-video-vesa
Vesa driver does not provide acceleration but will work with most hardware. It can be installed as a fallback to other drivers if for whatever reason they fail.
Install Radeon Drivers
Install open-source Radeon driver.
sudo pacman -S xf86-video-ati
Some new GPU’s may work with the newer xf86-video-amdgp drivers but there is not performance gain as of now.
Install Nvidia Drivers
Install open-source Nvidia driver.
sudo pacman -S xf86-video-nouveau
Install Intel Drivers
Install open-source Intel driver.
sudo pacman -S xf86-video-intel
Enable Multilib repositories
Open pacman configuration file.
sudo nano /etc/pacman.conf
Uncomment the following lines and save the file.
[multilib] Include = /etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist
Update the package list.
sudo pacman -Syu
Install Mesa Graphics Libraries
Install open-source graphics libraries.
sudo pacman -S mesa mesa-libgl
Install open-source 32-bit graphics libraries.
sudo pacman -S lib32-mesa lib32-mesa-libgl