I know this is an old(ish) thread, but (I think) the info is out of date and would be useful to get it up to date.
FreeBSD 10.0 will install easily now because of all the improvements that have been made. PC-BSD 10 is also using the new pkgng package manager as default, so they say, but it still has PBI. PBI is the reason that I personally did not use PC-BSD, as to me, it added bloat. However, in its favour, it was aimed at novice installers/users. I believe either will be installable by a newbie and give a satisfying experience of FreeBSD. I have installed both myself this week, I'm coming from Linux, but am confident anyone can now create their own installation without difficulty. Hope that helps a newbie to try out FreeBSD.
FreeBSD 10.0 will install easily now because of all the improvements that have been made. PC-BSD 10 is also using the new pkgng package manager as default, so they say, but it still has PBI. PBI is the reason that I personally did not use PC-BSD, as to me, it added bloat. However, in its favour, it was aimed at novice installers/users. I believe either will be installable by a newbie and give a satisfying experience of FreeBSD. I have installed both myself this week, I'm coming from Linux, but am confident anyone can now create their own installation without difficulty. Hope that helps a newbie to try out FreeBSD.