Cannot see my FreeBSD usb persistent installation on Macbook Air 2015 model

[Dawnvibe]

Hello everyone
I read many posts with the same problem and wandered if I made a mistake
I successfully installed FreeBsd 13.4 persistent on a Sandisk usb flash drive
my problem is
1) it doesn't show on my Macbook Air 2015 model during startup
2) it doesn't show on my secondary laptop with Debian Buster (on the Grub menu list)

did I make a mistake ?
should I have to start my Debian laptop from bios and restart from the usb....installing Grub in FreeBSD ?
or
should I I have to start my Debian laptop from bios and restart from the usb....installing ReFind in FreeBSD ?

my Debian Laptop is Asus E402W...pretty slow...and with 14" display so I prefer to use the smaller Macbook Air form-factor....So how can I make FreeBSD visible on startup ?

 

[NapoleonWils0n]

hi mate

i have Freebsd 14.1 on a Macbook Air 2011 and Macbook Pro Retina 2015

Are you saying you have created a usb installer for Freebsd
but that it doesnt show up when you plug it in and boot up the mac

you do need to use the latest version of Freebsd which is 14.1
so you get the latest drivers for the mac

you need to install Freebsd 14.1 on the usb drive

download the memstick.img.xz to install on a usb stick

wget https://download.freebsd.org/releases/amd64/amd64/ISO-IMAGES/14.1/FreeBSD-14.1-RELEASE-amd64-memstick.img.xz

download the checksum

wget https://download.freebsd.org/releases/amd64/amd64/ISO-IMAGES/14.1/CHECKSUM.SHA512-FreeBSD-14.1-RELEASE-amd64

Verify the checksum

sha512sum -c CHECKSUM.SHA512-FreeBSD-14.1-RELEASE-amd64 FreeBSD-14.1-RELEASE-amd64-memstick.img.xz

writing an image file to usb

extract the xz file

xz -dv FreeBSD-14.1-RELEASE-amd64-memstick.img.xz

dd the image to a usb drive

important replace /dev/xxx
in the command below with the path to usb drive

which you can find with lsblk on linux

sudo dd if=FreeBSD-14.1-RELEASE-amd64-memstick.img of=/dev/xxx bs=1M conv=sync

you need to press alt when the mac is booting up and you should a orange drive marked UEFI or EFI
select the right most disk in the list marked UEFI or EFI

you dont need to install ReFind

Freebsd 14 Wayland Desktop with Wayfire on a MacBook Air

Inspired by pure wayland desktop example i installed Freebsd on my old 2011 Macbook Air as a pure Wayland desktop with Wayfire in the video below i cover setting up wayland and wayfire with dbus for desktop notification with emacs ednc, zfs home datasets, beadm boot enviornments, ext2fs kernel...

forums.freebsd.org

cerberus/freebsd/freebsd-wayland.org at master · NapoleonWils0n/cerberus

cerberus code library. Contribute to NapoleonWils0n/cerberus development by creating an account on GitHub.

github.com

GitHub - NapoleonWils0n/freebsd-root: freebsd root dot files for mac air

freebsd root dot files for mac air. Contribute to NapoleonWils0n/freebsd-root development by creating an account on GitHub.

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GitHub - NapoleonWils0n/freebsd-dotfiles: freebsd dotfiles for macbook air

freebsd dotfiles for macbook air. Contribute to NapoleonWils0n/freebsd-dotfiles development by creating an account on GitHub.

github.com

 

[Dawnvibe]

hi mate

i have Freebsd 14.1 on a Macbook Air 2011 and Macbook Pro Retina 2015

Are you saying you have created a usb installer for Freebsd
but that it doesnt show up when you plug it in and boot up the mac


but you do need to use the latest version of Freebsd which is 14.1
so you get the latest drivers for the mac

you need to install Freebsd 14.1 on the usb drive

download the memstick.img.xz to install on a usb stick

wget https://download.freebsd.org/releases/amd64/amd64/ISO-IMAGES/14.1/FreeBSD-14.1-RELEASE-amd64-memstick.img.xz

download the checksum

wget https://download.freebsd.org/releases/amd64/amd64/ISO-IMAGES/14.1/CHECKSUM.SHA512-FreeBSD-14.1-RELEASE-amd64

Verify the checksum

sha512sum -c CHECKSUM.SHA512-FreeBSD-14.1-RELEASE-amd64 FreeBSD-14.1-RELEASE-amd64-memstick.img.xz

writing an image file to usb

extract the xz file

xz -dv FreeBSD-14.1-RELEASE-amd64-memstick.img.xz

dd the image to a usb drive

important replace /dev/xxx
in the command below with the path to usb drive

which you can find with lsblk on linux

sudo dd if=FreeBSD-14.1-RELEASE-amd64-memstick.img of=/dev/xxx bs=1M conv=sync

you need to press alt when the mac is booting up and you should a orange drive marked UEFI or EFI
select the right most disk in the list marked UEFI or EFI

you dont need to install ReFind

Freebsd 14 Wayland Desktop with Wayfire on a MacBook Air

Inspired by pure wayland desktop example i installed Freebsd on my old 2011 Macbook Air as a pure Wayland desktop with Wayfire in the video below i cover setting up wayland and wayfire with dbus for desktop notification with emacs ednc, zfs home datasets, beadm boot enviornments, ext2fs kernel...

forums.freebsd.org

cerberus/freebsd/freebsd-wayland.org at master · NapoleonWils0n/cerberus

cerberus code library. Contribute to NapoleonWils0n/cerberus development by creating an account on GitHub.

github.com

GitHub - NapoleonWils0n/freebsd-root: freebsd root dot files for mac air

freebsd root dot files for mac air. Contribute to NapoleonWils0n/freebsd-root development by creating an account on GitHub.

github.com

GitHub - NapoleonWils0n/freebsd-dotfiles: freebsd dotfiles for macbook air

freebsd dotfiles for macbook air. Contribute to NapoleonWils0n/freebsd-dotfiles development by creating an account on GitHub.

github.com

Thank you for your quick response
So I did made a mistake during installation (I already installed FreeBSD 13.4...From the Live usb to a secondary one as a persistent installation (i.e using the usb to run the OS and not the SSD from the Macbook Air)

My mistake was, during installation I chose GPT and not EFI

I'll get back to you with my results

 

[Dawnvibe]

I really do thank you