Get bia onto a USB stick
Download the bia writer for your computer, plug in a USB stick, and follow the three screens. Then start any PC or laptop from the stick.
1. Download the writer
2. Choose how bia should think
Cloud brain (recommended)
The smartest answers, using an AI service with your own account. Right now the cheapest good choice is DeepSeek V4.1: you pay only for what bia uses, and it runs on any computer. The stick stays small, but bia needs the internet. Paste your key into the writer and it is stored only on your stick.
Brain on the stick (optional)
For places without internet, a complete AI model can travel on the stick instead. Needs a larger stick and a powerful computer: a high-end graphics card, or unified memory, with at least 64 GB of video memory (VRAM). You can switch between the two later.
3. Write the stick and start a computer
- Plug in a USB stick of 8 GB or more. Everything on it will be replaced.
- Open the writer, pick the stick and the kind of computer it is for, choose the brain, and press Write. The first time, it downloads the bia system for that kind of computer (about 1 GB) and keeps it for the next stick.
- Plug the stick into the computer that will become bia and switch it on. If it starts its old system instead, open the computer’s start-up menu (often F12, F11, Esc or Option ⌥) and choose the USB stick.
- bia wakes up and greets you. Say hello!
One stick, one kind of computer. Ordinary PCs and ARM computers need different systems, so the writer asks which kind the stick is for. Have both? Make one stick for each.
- Ordinary PC: almost any Intel or AMD desktop or laptop, such as a ten-year-old office PC, a gaming PC or a Windows laptop. It starts with Secure Boot switched on, and older machines without the modern start-up (UEFI) start it the classic way (BIOS).
- ARM computer: ARM mini-PCs and boards whose start-up menu works the standard (UEFI) way. Whether Secure Boot can stay on depends on the machine: if the stick does not start, switch Secure Boot off in its settings.
- Not supported: Macs with Apple chips (M1 and newer) cannot start from a bia stick. They can still run the writer.
bia already lives on another kind of computer? Its mind can move across. For example, bia runs on an old Intel laptop and you bought an ARM mini-PC: make an ARM stick, start the mini-PC from it and tell the new bia to wait for the old one. Then ask the old bia to move over. Both screens show the same code, and once you confirm, its chats, memories, accounts and passwords arrive on the mini-PC. Keep the mini-PC online during the move, so bia can reinstall its extra programs in their ARM versions. How moving works
Other ways
Try it on your Mac
No stick needed: ClawHome runs bia in a virtual machine on an Apple Silicon Mac (macOS 13 or later). Create a Linux home, sign in to a cloud AI or paste a key, and ClawHome fetches the latest bia for you.
Servers and virtual machines
For servers, cloud machines and virtual machines, or computers you set up in bulk: start from the installer image, connect to a network, and the computer installs bia on its disk and waits for its mind to “fly” over from another bia.
For developers
bia is open source under GPL-3.0. The whole system, including the stick writer, can be built from source on Mac or Linux with Docker.