Solved Raspberry PI B with FreeBSD 11

Vctrsnts

Vctrsnts

Hi.
I currently have a Raspberry PI B with Raspbian, but I'm thinking to change for FreeBSD.

The RPI is connected to a HDD and SD. The /boot is in the SD where I have modified the /boot/config.txt file so that the rest of the system is on the HDD. In this way, only the SD is used for the RPI boot, then the HDD continues so the SD does not have as much use.

My question is whether this can be done in FreeBSD, because if so, I would switch to FreeBSD.

Iam testing with another SD with FreeBSD and /boot/msdos/CONFIG.txt I do not see the site where it would have to be added or modified to indicate that the rest of the system is in the HDD.

Thank you if you can solve this doubt.
 
Usually to do this I install freebsd (ARM) on a vm, update from source, install everything required, modify FSTAB to mount / as read only as many writes can degrade the memory card (especially if using swap from it), then create the image and write it to the sd card. Boot from the Pi, Mount the partition(s) on the external hdd you need to write stuff to.
 
Thanks for the help.

To see if I have not understood correctly, what you tell me, is to do an installation in a VM and update the system.

Modify the fstab, so that the access to the SD is read and then, copy the rest of the partitions of the SD to an external HD. It is right?

But then, I see a problem, as you tell FreeBSD that the rest of the system (except for the boot) is outside the SD, which is actually on the external HD ??

Again, thanks for the help
 
I usually leave the whole FreeBSD install on the SD card, mount the partitions as readonly, put /var and /tmp on memory disks (use rsync or something to sync var if needed on shutdown/startup).

The only partition I put on the external drives is a /data partition for storage. Not sure why you would want to put the whole FreeBSD system on the hard drive? May as well leave it on the SD card and mount your data partitions from the hard drive?
 
What model of raspberry pi is the one you have? I am thinking of buying one that is well supported by freebsd.
 
Thanks for the help.

I have the RPI 3 Model 3 that comes with a 64bit CPU. That's why I'm trying to install FreeBSD, because you can take advantage of the power it has and instead Raspbian this possibility does not have it ( is correct ):rolleyes:

lostpacket said:
May as well leave it on the SD card and mount your data partitions from the hard drive?
Click to expand...

Because if the SD is working every time the life is very short.

So, I'm going to do tests to see if I'm lucky.

Thanks to all for the help. I'll tell you how it goes ..

Thanks, again
 
Vctrsnts said:
Thanks for the help.
Because if the SD is working every time the life is very short.
Click to expand...

On anything that boots from an sd/flash cards I will install the o/s on vm, transfer it to SD when configured using dd or something and then mount the sd card read only. Forcing /var to be in memory.
 
Hi.

After struggling with FreeBSD, I got it to work from an external HDD :) The operation is a bit strange. I explain it in case anyone can interest you.

Copy the image to the SD, make the configuration, then through dd make the copy to the external HDD and before restarting again, modify the file /etc/fstab.

That is, do not delete the partition that you have in the SD because at the moment, I do not know why, when I start the system will look for information in the /boot directory of the SD, even if you have made a copy of that partition to the external HDD. Will you always perform a validation in SD?

I do not know why, I suppose in next versions this can be solved. But for now, everything is perfect, now I only have to configure to be able to add USB, correctly configure SSH and install the applications I need, but for now, everything perfect.

And that if I could check, if you make a top, is not running almost anything, not as in Raspbian, that there were a lot of processes running when you only had the newly installed system.

Thanks for the help

The adventure continues ...
 
Hi.

This is an update of the previous entry I made regarding FreeBSD running on my RPI3. :(

I'm sorry to report that I have stopped using FreeBSD because I see it very unstable.

The problem is that on Sunday everything was working properly. It started from an external HD and everything is correct (more information in the previous message) but yesterday, when I go to start the system, without having modified any file since Sunday, it is blocked in the message that comes after where it warns you not system in time? And it does not happen there. The same thing happens if I start the system from the SD.

I do not know, but at the moment, it is very unstable to use. It hurts me, because I liked how it worked, but I can not ...

See if later things change and can be used. :(

Thank you all for your help and advice.
 
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