Moving to FreeBSD

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lokiseto

What is a good procedure to move from a Windows XP to a FreeBSD desktop system? Looking for drivers, hardware specifications and so on. Tried several live versions. Had no luck with the last FreeSBIE 2.0.1-RELEASE. Frenzy worked like a charm. Will post specifications and reports if anyone is willing to tutor me through installation :)
 
Thanks guys, will post asap

So i cannot install or don't know how to under 8.2
and with the installer under 9.0 Beta 2 the basic system seems to work
 
FreeSBIE is ancient. Btw, FreeBSD always worked fine on my hardware, but FreeSBIE rarely worked good.
Last version doesn't work on any of my PC's.


PC-BSD is good place to start, especially if you don't have any UNIX knowledge
 
The last derived version of FreeSBIE is GhostBSD 2.0. We have developed toolkit from FreeSBIE toolkit. We maintain that tool alive. Several change have append but it still FreeSBIE idea. GhostBSD
 
Platform Technology Intel Centrino 2
Processor Intel Core 2 Duo T9550 / 2.66 GHz (Dual-Core)
Cache Memory 6 MB - L2 Cache


RAM DDR3 SDRAM - 1066 MHz
Graphics Controller NVIDIA GeForce 9300M GS
Video Memory 256 MB GDDR2 SDRAM
Input Device Keyboard, touchpad

Networking Network adapter - Ethernet, Fast Ethernet, Gigabit Ethernet, IEEE 802.11b, IEEE 802.11a, IEEE 802.11g, IEEE 802.11n (draft), Bluetooth 2.0 EDR
Wireless NIC Intel WiFi Link 5100
 
lokiseto said:
Platform Technology Intel Centrino 2
Processor Intel Core 2 Duo T9550 / 2.66 GHz (Dual-Core)
Cache Memory 6 MB - L2 Cache
Click to expand...

You will want to install the AMD64 iso.

lokiseto said:
RAM DDR3 SDRAM - 1066 MHz
Graphics Controller NVIDIA GeForce 9300M GS
Video Memory 256 MB GDDR2 SDRAM
Input Device Keyboard, touchpad
Click to expand...

Here are the installation instructions for xwindows:
http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/handbook/x11.html
You will need the nvidia driver located @ /usr/ports/x11/nvidia-driver

lokiseto said:
Networking Network adapter - Ethernet, Fast Ethernet, Gigabit Ethernet, IEEE 802.11b, IEEE 802.11a, IEEE 802.11g, IEEE 802.11n (draft), Bluetooth 2.0 EDR
Wireless NIC Intel WiFi Link 5100
Click to expand...

We should start with the nic. When you in the installation your driver will be detected. At that time it will want to autoconfigure it with dhcp. It will write out to a file called /etc/rc.conf We will go over that later.

Here is the handbook on wireless and bluetooth:
http://www.freebsd.org/doc/handbook/network-wireless.html
http://www.freebsd.org/doc/handbook/network-bluetooth.html

My suggestion is to get the AMD64 iso from here: http://www.freebsd.org/where.html

You will want to read up about tuning()(7) slices. Though its not required.

Ask any questions you have when in the install on this thread and I'll help where I can.

~
 
@UNIXgod

This time I got a good feeling about moving to FreeBSD. Thanks for your support. I am still in the preparing phase :)

One more question: with moving to FreeBSD I also want to change my harddisk since there seems to be no conflict with SATA support in FreeBSD. I'd like to know how one can derive if the mainboard supports a SATAII interface (I am not sure about backwards compatibility; I do not know the controller and I am stuck finding it out).

At the moment I use a noisy Toshiba Hornet A160 320GB, SATA (MHZ2320BJ) which would be replaced with an OCZ or Intel (recommendations are welcome, if any).
 
Commenced installation

I am a bit puzzled, i tried to install on esata interface
and seemed to work, now exchanged with old hd
and install procedure stops after partitioning

;)

I get the following error message

Installer on 'Commit' step shows
Unable to find device node for /dev/ad4s1b in /dev!
The creation of filesystems will be aborted.

the data of disk model
http://www.tweaktown.com/reviews/2798/solidata_k5_64_slc_indilinx_solid_state_drive/index2.html

bios recognizes the ssd as indilinx

maybe related :\
also i experienced difficulties with several partitioning after slicing
one slice commited worked
two FreebBsd worked
three 2x FreeBsd 1x Dos afterwards partitioning didn't work reported
some kind of size error

thanks in advance
 
AFAIR, that can be caused by trying to install on a GPT disk. If you have a GPT partitioning scheme, FreeBSD 9's installer will handle that. FreeBSD-8's sysinstall only does MBR.

That error can also be caused by choosing "Write" in sysinstall instead of Quit.
 
So i will post verbatim what i did and didn't understand

I read the first chapters about slicing partitioning using fdisk editor, seems fine to me

So i fumbled a bit with the slices and the install seems to work but only if i use
this configuration:

Disk name: ad4
Disk Geometry: 124053 cyls/16 heads/63 sectors = 125045424 sectors (61057MB)

Offset Size(ST) End Name PType Desc Subtype Flags

0 34 33 - 12 unused 0
34 ad4p1 5 unused 0
162 tolazytotype ad4p2 5 unused 0
117440546 ad4p3 5 unused 0
123691042 - 5 unused 0

this configuration works
but if A is selected to use the entire disk the above posted error message
gets returned.
The p stands for parallel / partition ?
and ad4s1 for seriell or slice ?

and why does the install not work if not named ad4p1

:)

BTW may there be an edit function in near future :r
 
Sorry, I'm lost. Is this a single drive that will be for FreeBSD only?

s is for slice (what MS-DOS calls a partition)
p is a FreeBSD partition, a subdivision of a slice.

For that notebook and that SSD, I'd recommend FreeBSD 9, even though it's beta.
 
@wblock it's a single drive Solidata K5-64

I use the FreeBSD-9.0-CURRENT-201008-amd64-dvd.iso at the moment.

Procedure so far (don't know how to access the vty1 debug output):

  • choose default installation, language and the like
  • assuming the geometry is 124053/16/63 Solidata K5-64 64GB SLC
    The FDISK Partition Editor suggests the
    the previously posted table, whereby ad4p1 - 3 are not of correct
    type PType is 5 and Description is unknown
    the last sectors 123691042 to 125045423 are unnamed "-" and unused
    when I convert it to a DOS partition (automatically named to ad4ps1 ?: )
    the install works fine, but i don't want it to be sliced that way

Whenever I press A and make the largest slice bootable FreeBSD installer returns
Code: 
Unable to find device node for /dev/ad4s1b in /dev!
The creation of filesystems will be aborted.

I would like to name the partitions myself but don't know how and what FreeBSD does during install, feedback for me is too sparse.
 
If there isn't anything else on the disk, it makes it easier. Actual screen output would help, I can't tell if you're using sysinstall or the new bsdinstaller. It sounds like the old sysinstall, but FreeBSD-9 should use the new one.
 
i wanted to move completely to unix world with bsd

therefore no windows on that disk
i will try to figure out a way to make screen output available

as mentioned i use the FreeBSD-9.0-CURRENT-201008-amd64-dvd.iso
will read up on the installer

thanks wblock
 
Aha. It finally dawned on me that you're using a very old snapshot. Get FreeBSD-9.0-BETA1-amd64-disc1.iso instead. Yes, get the CD version instead of the DVD.
 
used the FreeBSD-9.0-BETA2-amd64-dvd1.iso

Currently I try to install some packages and get an overview

my NICs were found, so i tried to add packages over ftp
but somehow i cannot connect (tried some servers mostly primary ones and local)

unable to transfer the base distribution from
ftp1..
do you want to try to retrieve it again ?

Edit starts here
----------------------------------------------------------------------
So I will post whatever information about install procedure I can give
 
Your post makes no sense. You're mixing base system and port/package terminology. Make sure you understand the crucial difference between the base system (FreeBSD) and third-party applications (ports/packages).
 
ports installation

The system is running now and I want to install ports

I used a FreeBSD-9.0-BETA2-amd64-bootonly.iso that could connect
to some ftps during install process
After reboot and suggestion to change the Release Name to "any"
(changing the ftp does not seem to work) i still cannot access data
The problem seems to occur during the attempt to fetch the
packages/INDEX file from any ftp

------------------------------------
pkg_add -r xorg works though :r
 
How can one install ports from usb stick or cd
What configurations can be made without internet access ?
("driver installation" ?)
 
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