9.0 beta2 & the new bsdinstaller

[Nathan Whitehorn]

On 09/19/11 02:52, Fbsd8 wrote:
> Kevin Oberman wrote:
>> On Sun, Sep 18, 2011 at 2:55 AM, <"Thomas Mueller
>> <mueller6727"@bellsouth.net> wrote:
>>> Some more ideas on the new bsdinstaller cross my mind.
>>>
>>> Since the way the bsdinstaller would make partitions is
>>> unpredictable, at least to the uninitiated, and in all likelihood at
>>> variance with how much space the user wants to allocate, it might be
>>> better to offer a roadmap to help guide the user to allocating space
>>> for FreeBSD using gpart or Rod Smith's gdisk.
>>>
>>> Also, I can't see the function of the 64 KB boot partition with no
>>> file system, which does not boot for me, though I can boot the main
>>> partition using grub2 from the System Rescue CD (http://sysresccd.org/).
>>
>> The 64KB freebsd-boot partition is to contain the GPT boot code which
>> is used by UEFI BIOS in
>> place of the old MBR used by legacy BIOS. You need to use gpart(8) to
>> write the GPT boot code to that partition, but I don't know if
>> bsdinstall does so. It might just write the PMBR that is used for
>> booting with legacy BIOS. I'll admit that I have not checked. (See the
>> gpart(8) man page for details on writing the pmbr and gptboot.) I
>> assume bsdinstall writes both so that AMD64 machines with EFI and
>> 32-bit systems will both work. This is very different from the old
>> traditional slice/partition system.
>
> The above info is another example of the type of information that should
> be added to a "help" option on the dialog screen for the bsdinstall disk
> configuration function.
>
> I also think that the bsdinstaller should offer the user an option to
> select between using the old MBR configuration used by legacy BIOS that
> sysinstall uses and the new gpart configuration which bsdinstall offers
> now.

You absolutely can do new MBR installs, as well as new straight bsdlabel 
installs ("dangerously dedicated"). You just have to use the partition 
editor instead of the autopartitioner, and then choose to use the 
appropriate partition type.
-Nathan