FreeBSD 10.4 Stable installation on Dell Inspiron 1545 with Intel T6400 Core 2 duo

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Vinay Sonwani

Hi All,

I am trying to install FreeBSD 10.4 Stable on my Dell Inspiron 1545.

After downloading memstick.img file and creating bootable usb drive from rufus, I am able to boot FreeBSD on my system but after FreeBSD welcome screen nothing happens, it gets stuck there. I have tried disabling secure boot, ACPI support and everything else I found on Google.

I have used many Linux distros on the same machine before like Kubuntu 15.10 and 16.04 etc. All these worked fine.

Please help me as I am very excited to use FreeBSD.
 

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Ok that image should be right. With your machine being older I do not think that would be a UEFI model.
It would not hurt to check the UEFI-memstick image.

Maybe you need to read up on loader prompt tweaks. Perhaps your video console mode needs help.

You do realize -FreeBSD "stable" is not really desirable for new users right?
You cannot use freebsd-update on it and must rebuild manually.
The moniker stable is a misnomer too as it has new features fresh out of testing in -CURRENT
It is steady and reliable but you must rebuild world every so often. For a new user that is a tough learning curve.
Checkout -RELEASE and run freebsd-update for easy release security patching.
I use 10.4 Release and it is a good release. Mostly I use 11.1 -Release and I have been staying away from -CURRENT.
Too much churn.
 
Vinay Sonwani said:
Hi All,

I am trying to install FreeBSD 10.4 Stable on my Dell Inspiron 1545.

After downloading memstick.img file and creating bootable usb drive from rufus, I am able to boot FreeBSD on my system but after FreeBSD welcome screen nothing happens, it gets stuck there. I have tried disabling secure boot, ACPI support and everything else I found on Google.

I have used many Linux distros on the same machine before like Kubuntu 15.10 and 16.04 etc. All these worked fine.

Please help me as I am very excited to use FreeBSD.
Click to expand...


For what it's worth I successfully installed 11.1 on that machine with USB stick. CD was a no go so went with USB. UEFI not needed btw. Everything worked except I did have to swap out the Broadcom wifi card with an Intel eventually, it just wouldn't cooperate. It was a chore getting it to go, from the command prompt I think I had to enter set debug.acpi.disabled="hostres" then hit boot. It did hang on some stuff for a long time then continued. Stick with it you will get it to work. zfs worked just fine.I had other notes on my install I just can't find them
 
Hi All,

I finally installed FreeBSD 10.4 release on my machine. :)

All I had to do was to hit entry no 3 at boot screen of FreeBSD which says escape to boot loader.

Phishfry
As you said, my machine doesn't show any entry regarding UEFI in boot settings but this time I downloaded UEFI memstick.img and it get installed. How this is possible ?

Also I installed it as dual boot with Windows 10 but when I turn my PC on, it directally boots into Windows 10. I was thinking it will install multiboot loader like grub or something but it didn't.

Please guide me to achieve this.
 
Vinay Sonwani said:
Hi All,

I finally installed FreeBSD 10.4 release on my machine. :)

All I had to do was to hit entry no 3 at boot screen of FreeBSD which says escape to boot loader.

Phishfry
As you said, my machine doesn't show any entry regarding UEFI in boot settings but this time I downloaded UEFI memstick.img and it get installed. How this is possible ?

Also I installed it as dual boot with Windows 10 but when I turn my PC on, it directally boots into Windows 10. I was thinking it will install multiboot loader like grub or something but it didn't.

Please guide me to achieve this.
Click to expand...


Sounds like you might need to modify the Windows bootloader if that is what is booting up by default, a quick search can provide what you are looking for. Be warned, you can screw it up where Windows won't boot either so be careful.
 
Vinay Sonwani said:
I am able to boot FreeBSD on my system but after FreeBSD welcome screen nothing happens, it gets stuck there.
Click to expand...
Just had exactly the same experience with FreeBSD 14.2 (as well as GhostBSD and NomadBSD) on a Dell Inspiron 1545.

In particular: after selecting multi user from the boot loader menu [edited to add: trying to boot into the installer on my USB drive], the line "Loading kernel..." appeared, and on the line below, I had a blinking cursor and a slash character which is supposed to "spin", but didn't. The installer was stuck and no further progress was made.

Vinay Sonwani said:
All I had to do was to hit entry no 3 at boot screen of FreeBSD which says escape to boot loader.
Click to expand...
What worked for me: at the installer's boot menu change Cons from Video to Serial by repeatedly pressing the displayed key (C or 5). Then press Enter to boot multi user.

Once the installation completed, it was never necessary to repeat this on subsequent boots [edited to add: into the FreeBSD system installed on my hard drive].
 
BigSneakyDuck When you reboot, make sure you pull the USB out and see if that fixes it. I had the same issue till I did that.

I haven't dealt with mine in a while so I'm booting it up to see what my issue with it was. Right now, I'm upgrading it from 14.1 to 14.1pwhatever (cause I forgot to look at what it was).
 
drhowarddrfine said:
BigSneakyDuck When you reboot, make sure you pull the USB out and see if that fixes it. I had the same issue till I did that.
Click to expand...
My problem, which from the looks of it was the same as Vinay Sonwani's, was that I couldn't boot into the installer on my USB drive. Like Vinay, it would hang immediately after starting to boot into multi user from the FreeBSD boot loader menu: I'd get as far as "Loading kernel..." and that was it. But once I found a way around that and got FreeBSD installed on my hard drive, the curious thing is that booting into the installed FreeBSD worked fine. (Even when I've tried with the USB still inserted! Maybe it helps that my BIOS boot order has the USB last?)

astyle said:
14.2-RELEASE installer does offer an option to shut down in addition to a reboot. I'd suggest taking the shutdown option, that makes it easier to remove the USB stick.
Click to expand...
Yep, since this feature was added, I've always done it this way. It's a great quality of life improvement - have praised it elsewhere too. In fact a lot of work's being done on the installer in preparation for 15.0-RELEASE and I really appreciate it.
 
Vinay Sonwani said:
All I had to do was to hit entry no 3 at boot screen of FreeBSD which says escape to boot loader.
Click to expand...
I've done a bit more experimenting on my Inspiron 1545 and Vinay's method also works for me: I could successfully boot into the installer memstick by pressing 3 at the boot loader menu to "escape to loader prompt" then typing boot.

I then set up FreeBSD on a persistent live USB and tried booting into that. That also consistently froze immediately after the boot menu, so this isn't just an issue with the installer memstick image: it seems the Inspiron 1545 doesn't like booting into FreeBSD on a USB stick in general. Again, I found I could boot successfully if I set Cons from Video to Serial at the boot menu, or by Vinay's trick of escaping to the loader prompt and typing boot.
 
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