How do I go back to Windows from FreeBSD?

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Elliott32224

I have a mini PC that I was using for pfSense. I no longer need this mini PC for pfSense and I want to go back to Windows OS (unfortunately, I did not set up separate partitions for both OS's). Is there a simple way to do this? Thanks.
 
Elliott32224 said:
I have a mini PC that I was using for pfSense. I no longer need this mini PC for pfSense and I want to go back to Windows OS (unfortunately, I did not set up separate partitions for both OS's). Is there a simple way to do this? Thanks.
Click to expand...
Very simple, gparted iso and install Windows,
 
Boot up off FreeBSD Installer USB Memstick and use LiveCD mode. Then blank disk.
gpart destroy -F /dev/$device-name

$device-name could be NVMe or SATA or DirectAttached. You can find it by looking at gpart show -p
 
Elliott32224 said:
Is there a simple way to do this? Thanks.
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If it can boot regular BIOS x86 or UEFI, I'm thinking it should be easy to boot an official Windows iso written to USB:
  • If it's MBR: I'd use WoeUSB from a Linux LiveUSB to create the USB drive (it handles the boot sector thing)
  • If it's UEFI: You can likely copy a Windows iso's extracted files/folders as-is to a USB FAT32 or NTFS and boot no problem (I do it with Dell)
  • If you have access to a Windows computer: I'd use Rufus and write a Windows iso in MBR mode (covers boot sector and boots UEFI as-is; WoeUSB does too)
Windows ISOs can come from anywhere, but SHA256 it and make sure it compares to Microsoft sources as an official ISO.
 
DutchDaemon

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Elliott32224 said:
I want to go back to Windows OS
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Boot from any bootable Windows installation medium; the installer will allow you to wipe and reformat an NTFS based partition over any existing partitions on the disk. Then just complete the remaining steps in the installer.

As a reminder, you must remove the existing partition first; then reformat the drive with whatever filesystem the installer provides. If you don't; it'll throw an error. This is universal across OSes.

Good luck with Windows 11..
 
mer said:
Or open unit, toss storage, add new storage, install windows.
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No need to toss storage, just format it using the installer for new OS... Most OSes that have their act togethe will offer to format the storage. If the storage is not detected in the BIOS, though - time to troubleshoot.
 
Elliott32224 said:
and I want to go back to Windows OS
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Are you just going to repeat the same question? Or still not figured out how to remove partitions or wipe the drive?
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Post in thread 'If I install FreeBSD is there a way back to Windows?'

So, have been using FreeBSD for running pfSense. One of my computers (a mini-PC purchased on Amazon) I no longer need for pfSense and I want to go back to Windows. The recovery USB that I created, before installing FreeBSD is not able to restore Windows. I tried a fresh install of Windows, but this failed due to incorrect partitions. I think that I need to wipe the drive and re-install compatible partitions. How would I do this? I do not readily see a way to open this mini PC to replace the hard drive with a Windows one. Thanks.

Looks like you haven't learned much the past 4 years
E

Thread 'FreeBSD 11.3-STABLE not booting up'

I am using FreeBSD 11.3-STABLE for pfSense. In the process of restoring an old backup for pfSense, everything got trashed on the computer. So, now, when I boot up the computer, I get "no boot loader (see attached photo)." I put in the default and nothing happens. I tried to reinstall from a USB drive, but that doesn't work. Being a novice at this, how can I get out of this part to a prompt to get other information to boot from the USB drive to reinstall? Thanks.

Or 5 years ago.
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Post in thread 'Installing FreeBSD 11.xx/12.xx - Atkbd0 GIANT LOCKED'

pgauret said:
At boot loader prompt, choose to configure boot options (or similar wording) and try:
unset hint.uart.1.at
boot

If this works, you can permanently comment the
Code: 
hint.uart.1.at="isa"
entry in /boot/device.hints
Click to expand...
I am a noobie here. The "unset" command worked for me with this issue of locking up on boot. However, I need help as to how to make this permanent.
Do I edit a file called "device.hints" and if so, how do I do this? I have looked for this file and so far cannot find it. Thanks in advance. Elliott
 
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