Planning on switching from Linux to FreeBSD

P

poleado

Hi guys. I'm planning a switch from Linux to FreeBSD. Problem is, I'm just starting to use linux. I'm using aptosid (if you guys know it) and have learned a few shell commands, but I'm not very knowledgeable on this at all, as I was mainly a GUIer. I am willing to learn, though.

First question is: ftp://ftp.freebsd.org/pub/FreeBSD/releases/amd64/ISO-IMAGES/8.1/
Which ISO from the above link am I supposed to get? I've only got a blank CD-RW. My processor's a Pentium D.

I'll probably be asking more questions as I go on, but I expect that the handbook would guide me through the installation process. I am planning to make my PC FreeBSD only. Is the installation process in shell mode, and if so, is there any way to view the handbook during the process?
 
The first CD will be enough. You don't want to install any packages from the RELEASE CD/DVD anyway as they are old.

Just do a basic install, update the base OS, update the ports tree and then begin to install the ports you need/want.

You already found the handbook, good. Most, if not all, your questions will be answered in there. Unfortunately you can't access it during the install.
 
Yes, that will do nicely. And no, there's no GUI, at all. Not even after you've done the installation. You will need ports to have that installed.
 
poleado said:
Is the installation process in shell mode, and if so, is there any way to view the handbook during the process?
Click to expand...
Better print it out or organise a spare PC. Even after installation you won't have a GUI, nor even an automatically configured, working network.

Or experiment with it in a virtual machine first.
 
If you want a desktop system, I suggest that your first run at FreeBSD be through PC-BSD so that you can set up things like ZFS without difficulty. Get yourself familiar with the OS. Read the Handbook or a good book like FreeBSD Unleashed. Setting up FreeBSD from scratch allows you to customize your distribution but most people prefer to be up an running quickly and then learn about the OS. PC-BSD allows you to do that.
Good luck.
 
Thanks for the tips, guys. It seems I'm gonna need a lot of time on my hands, eh? Building a system from scratch and just using what I want seems really nice, but the costs of time and ink makes me think twice. I won't do it now, but maybe someday. I'll think about the using FreeBSD on a virtual desktop (never actually tried a virtual desktop before).
 
You can use packages instead of Ports, you can pretty much install generic desktop using DVD1 ....
Once you have generic desktop and internet, you can do anything you want....

Time required to setup most basic generic desktop can be as low as maybe 30-40min to 2h
All depends how you do it... and what you want.
 
I don't understand all that much about how Ports works, and as much as possible if I'll be using FreeBSD, I would want to do things the FreeBSD way. I don't understand how any package installation thing apart from apt-get (which is of Debian) works. Although I think it would benefit me much if I learn Ports.
 
I really strongly suggest starting out with PC-BSD, specially if you have a spare disk lying around or if your disk is large enough to allocate some empty space as a primary partition for bsd-style "logical partitions" (slices - root can only be installed to a bsd acceptable slice). Also bsd does not write to ext3 / 4. PC-BSD will take care of all of this for you. But I would read about ZFS before beginning the install.

The above is all about the HDD setup. I found that once you had a running system, playing around and learning about something new becomes a lot easier - so you want to have an operating desktop at the soonest, you can play around with stuff from then-on. Also, you are going to have a lot of "config" options to deal with and this will quickly frustrate you if you don't have the know-how. For all the other stuff (ports, etc) PC-BSD has GUI's to help you.
 
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