Sub Second Rebuilds • QEMU/KVM + Bare Metal USB Flasher

Quick Start & Dual Partition GPT USB Architecture

Almandine OS decouples the lightweight 64 MB FAT32 EFI System Partition from the multi gigabyte GGUF model partition, enabling sub 0.5 second code rebuilds while streaming models at full NVMe/USB 3.2 bandwidth.

1. CLI Virtual Development (KVM + OVMF + 8 P Cores)

Rebuilds BOOTX64.EFI in <0.5s and boots directly in your Ubuntu terminal:

./scripts/dev_run.sh

2. Graphical UEFI GOP Window + Serial Console

Launches the 1024×768 32 bit RGB UEFI GOP window alongside COM1 serial output:

./scripts/dev_run.sh --gui

3. Build Standalone Dual Partition GPT USB Image

Packages Partition 1 (FAT32 ESP) + Partition 2 (Raw GGUF v3 payload):

./scripts/flash_usb.sh --image build/almandine_usb.img

4. Boot Full Dual Partition USB Image in QEMU+KVM

Verifies raw GPT Partition 2 GGUF auto discovery and 16 MiB chunked streaming:

./scripts/dev_run.sh --usb

5. Flash Physical 16 GB+ USB Drive for Bare Metal Boot

Verifies removable USB drive geometry and writes the bootable appliance:

./flash-usb.sh

Decoupled GPT USB & NVMe Storage Layout

By placing the raw .gguf file directly on GPT Partition 2 (starting at LBA 0 of the partition with magic 0x46554747 "GGUF"), Almandine OS bypasses FAT32 4 GiB file limits and filesystem cluster indirection.

GPT HEADER & PROTECTIVE MBR LBA 0..33

Standard UEFI GUID Partition Table

PARTITION 1: EFI SYSTEM (FAT32) 64 MiB

\EFI\BOOT\BOOTX64.EFI: Freestanding Almandine OS Shim + ggml-cpu + Unnamed model Engine (Rebuilds in <0.5s)

PARTITION 2: RAW GGUF v3 STREAM ~2 GB to ~16 GB

Direct EFI_BLOCK_IO_PROTOCOL 16 MiB chunked DMA stream into the 2 MiB aligned Write Back RAM Arena (Zero Copy Tensor Binding)

[  OK  ] GGUF Block Device Detected: GGUF v3 (291 tensors ready)
16MiB Pipeline   [████████████████████████] 100% (18.42 GB/s)
[  OK  ] Unnamed model GGUF Engine Ready (Zero Copy 2MB WB Arena)
            