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Date:      Sun, 12 Jul 2015 18:27:40 -0600 (MDT)
From:      Warren Block <wblock@wonkity.com>
To:        Polytropon <freebsd@edvax.de>
Cc:        reg@dwf.com, FreeBSD questions <freebsd-questions@freebsd.org>
Subject:   Re: FreeBSD install.
Message-ID:  <alpine.BSF.2.20.1507121814060.9702@wonkity.com>
In-Reply-To: <20150712221641.69f81f00.freebsd@edvax.de>
References:  <201507120402.t6C427Dg001385@deneb.dwf.com> <20150712221641.69f81f00.freebsd@edvax.de>

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On Sun, 12 Jul 2015, Polytropon wrote:

> On Sat, 11 Jul 2015 22:02:07 -0600, reg@dwf.com wrote:
>> I have been trying for several months to put PCBSD 10.1 and FreeBSD 10.1
>> on one disk. I finally gave up, and am installing FreeBSD over
>> the top of my previous PCBSD. sigh.
>
> It should be no big problem to allocate two slices, put
> FreeBSD in one, PC-BSD in the other, and add the FreeBSD
> boot manager to select which OS to boot. This has been
> possible for decades now, and it isn't "special".
>
>
>
>> After several attempts to put FreeBSD in a partition on the disk
>> I gave up, and let it have the full 500GB disk.  Mumph.
>
> Did you use MBR or GPT partitioning? As far as I remember,
> the GPT approach doesn't support boot manager use yet.

Grub can do that.  Doing it from the installer will require command-line 
use and familiarity with the tools:
https://forums.freebsd.org/threads/gpt-multiboot.49055/

Instead of dual-booting, I recommend using VM software.  VirtualBox is 
free, does not require any messing about with existing partitions, and 
allows the VM client to run at the same time as the host.

>> And why isnt the installer smart enough to install to a partition,
>> every other OS in existence can do that.
>
> Depends on how "every other OS in existence" defines what "partition"
> means. :-)

I'm fairly sure that the installer will install to a partition if one is 
available or created with the partitioning screen.  It will still be up 
to the user to install boot0, which of course only works with MBR 
primary partitions.  The four-partition limit of MBR often means that 
the ugly partition-with-a-partition format is required:
https://forums.freebsd.org/threads/creating-a-traditional-mbr-layout-with-bsdinstall.45072/



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