Getting Started

From a USB stick to talking to your computer — in plain English, no Linux experience needed. Take your time; every step is normal.

1

Put ThorOS on a USB stick

Download the ISO from the download button. Then use a free tool — balenaEtcher (easiest) or Rufus — to write it onto an 8 GB or larger USB stick. Open the tool, pick the ISO, pick your USB stick, click Flash. Takes about 10 minutes.

2

Boot from the USB & install

Leave the USB in and restart the computer. As it powers on, tap the boot-menu key (often F12, F2, Esc, or Del — it flashes on screen for a second) and choose the USB stick. At the ThorOS menu choose Start installer and follow the prompts. Prefer to try it first without changing your computer? Choose Live system instead.

3

First boot — give it 10–20 minutes

The very first time ThorOS starts, it quietly does two one-time jobs in the background: sets up your graphics card and downloads its AI brain (about 5 GB). This needs an internet connection. You can use the desktop while it works.

This is normal — please be patient. Your assistant isn't ready until that download finishes (roughly 10–20 minutes on a typical connection). If you have an NVIDIA graphics card, restart once after the first setup so it switches to the fast graphics driver.
4

Talk to Jarvis

Your assistant is named Jarvis by default. Just say "Jarvis" and then what you want — naturally, in one breath. No "hey", no button. Don't have a microphone? Open the Jarvis Chat window from the app menu and type instead.

Things to try

🌐

Open things

"Jarvis, open Firefox."
"Jarvis, open my files."

✍️

Write

"Jarvis, write a thank-you note to my landlord."

🧮

Ask anything

"Jarvis, what's 15% of 240?"
"Jarvis, explain photosynthesis simply."

🪄

Rename it

"Jarvis, call yourself Athena."
Then just say "Athena." The name is the wake word.

If something's not right

Almost everything below comes down to "the AI is still downloading." Here's how to check.

Jarvis says "I'm still getting set up."
That's the AI brain still downloading (Step 3). Give it 10–20 minutes and try again.

Replies are very slow.
If your PC has an NVIDIA graphics card, the fast driver finishes installing on the first restart. Reboot once and Jarvis will get much quicker.

Want to check the AI downloaded correctly?
Open the Terminal app (click Activities in the top-left, type Terminal, press Enter). Then type this and press Enter:

ollama list

You should see a line with qwen3:8b. If the list is empty, download it by hand — type this and wait until it reaches 100%:

ollama pull qwen3:8b

When it's done, say "Jarvis" again — it'll answer.

💬 Still stuck? You're not alone — open an issue on GitHub and we'll help you get going. Please don't give up on it; we want everyone to be able to use this.

Ready?

Grab the ISO and give it a try — it's free and 100% yours.