systemrescue-zfs VS archiso-zfs

There's a rescue system here with zfs support pre installed: https://github.com/nchevsky/systemrescue-zfs/tags

It looks like the boot-pool on the original SSDs just got flat out destroyed when installing the new copy on the usb stick. I used this recovery image from here: https://github.com/nchevsky/systemrescue-zfs/releases and booted the system with all disks installed. 'zdb -e boot-pool' spit out a load of unneeded stuff and a list of the most recent zpool commands run on the pool. What do you say, zpool destroy was the last command run on it at the time of the usb installation... One 'zpool import -Df boot-pool' later the pool was visible again. 'zpool export boot-pool' and a reboot later the system once again boots into the original install.

DKMS is the best option if you really want to keep up with Arch updates and if you're experienced with Linux (for instance you know how to fix your system from the archiso if needed -- for ZFS you'll need to manually load the zfs module from the archiso; this script is very helpful).

Make an EFI boot partition of maybe 200MB using your favorite distro iso and make a zpool on a second partition of the remaining space followed by a single dataset on that zpool named root at the minimum with normalization=formD, compression=lz4 or zstd and optional encryption flags and install your rootfs to that. I've found this process is easiest using the Archlinux ISO and this github project to get zfs in the archiso environment.

The script available there: https://github.com/eoli3n/archiso-zfs makes it extremely easy to add ZFS support to any Arch ISO after it has booted. You can copy any standard ISO to a USB drive, boot off it, then run `curl -s https://raw.githubusercontent.com/eoli3n/archiso-zfs/master/... | bash` and you'll have ZFS support in a few seconds, without having anything to worry about.

With Arch there is an easy way to get the iso to read ZFS with a simple script, it is a bit of a no no unless you verify the script before using it. https://github.com/eoli3n/archiso-zfs

My own experience is with ZFS, first on Arch Linux (using the excellent https://github.com/eoli3n/archiso-zfs). I learned a lot doing that and modifying the scripts to my liking.

You can load zfs modules in the archiso with: https://github.com/eoli3n/archiso-zfs

Because zfs isn't part of the mainline kernel -- you need to add the appropriate packages during the install process -- meaning you need to either boot from a standard Arch ISO install disk and then download the packages as explained here: https://github.com/eoli3n/archiso-zfs or you need to make a custom arch ISO where you add the zfs packages. https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/ZFS#Create_an_Archiso_image_with_ZFS_support. The only issue with creating the custom ArchISO -- you need an actual basic arch installation somewhere to create the disk -- so basically you need a standard Arch installation to create a custom install disk whereby you can install an Arch zfs installation. Here are other good tutorials for this: https://ramsdenj.com/2016/06/23/arch-linux-on-zfs-part-1-embed-zfs-in-archiso.html

Both ZFS updates and pacman breaking are rare enough that I forgot that would happen. Though using this rescue system would work, there's also a group that maintains a script to grab the correct ZFS module for a running archiso, might come in handy for you.

https://github.com/eoli3n/archiso-zfs

You're having a problem due to archiso not updating every time the kernel updates, though you could fix this issue there's also just an easier way. The archzfs repo group has made a tool to grab the correct zfs module for the running kernel, see https://github.com/eoli3n/archiso-zfs