FreeBSD with Win7 and UEFI

[Valeri Galtsev]

On Sun, December 28, 2014 5:26 pm, Dale Scott wrote:
>
>> On Dec 28, 2014, at 2:56 PM, Valeri Galtsev <galtsev at kicp.uchicago.edu>
>> wrote:
>>
>>
>>> On Sun, December 28, 2014 1:40 pm, Warren Block wrote:
>>>> On Sun, 28 Dec 2014, Christian Baer wrote:
>>>>
>>>> This is a little redundant, but I really want to make this clear...
>>>>
>>>> My motherboard is a Supermicro X10SAT. When the system starts, I can
>>>> press
>>>> F12 which lets me choose the boot device (basicly like in the BIOS
>>>> setup, but
>>>> an a temporary basis). This is a *motherboard* function, this is not a
>>>> boot
>>>> manager from any OS. The motherboard recognises both Windows (list
>>>> item:
>>>> "Windows boot manager") and FreeBSD (list item: "EFI OS").
>>>>
>>>> I have seen no other boot manager after the installation nor did I see
>>>> any
>>>> chance to choose/configure/check one during the installation of
>>>> FreeBSD.
>>>> The
>>>> handbook in rather silent about this subject too, which is quite a
>>>> surprise
>>>> to me. When I started out with Linux, everything was about being able
>>>> to
>>>> coexist with Windows on a single machine. I switched to FreeBSD a
>>>> little
>>>> later. My first FreeBSD CDs were of v3.3 (that was 1999 and I am
>>>> feeling
>>>> very
>>>> old right about now). The FreeBSD boot manager of back then wasn't as
>>>> pretty
>>>> as the one supplied with SuSE at the time but it did the same thing.
>>>>
>>>> Is this an EFI thing or have the priorities shifted?
>>>
>>> UEFI is a whole new game, utterly different from what came before.  And
>>> FreeBSD's UEFI support is new.  As far as I know, it has no provision
>>> for multibooting in UEFI.  Code to do that would be welcome, it's been
>>> difficult just to get the current UEFI support.
>>>
>>> Your boot menu suggests that Windows 7 is installed for standard BIOS
>>> booting.  The easiest way to deal with this is to reinstall FreeBSD for
>>> standard BIOS booting also, with an MBR format.  Then you can install
>>> the boot0 multiboot program, but it really doesn't offer anything that
>>> the BIOS boot menu does not already have.
>>>
>>> Please also consider running FreeBSD as a VM with one of the many
>>> virtualization options.  That has many advantages over multiboot
>>> setups.
>>
>> There is a big difference: in last case you have the machine running
>> Windows 7. Just out of curiosity: do _you_ have the same level of trust
>> to
>> Windows 7/8 system as you do to FreeBSD? If yes, why at all would you go
>> into trouble running FreeBSD? Just curious (no offense to
>> anyone/anything
>> intended ;-)
>>
>> Valeri
>
> For me, it's about how FreeBSD enables building and experimenting with
> systems of applications in ways that wouldn't be possible on Windows
> (arguably from a pragmatic perspective, not necessarily technically).
>
> Dale
>

I see... If to keep Windows as the system machine is running then Windows
+ cygwin is something that might be much nicer and smoother the Windows
--> Virtual Machine --> FreeBSD. Of course, cygwin is pretty much Linux as
opposed to FreeBSD being FreeBSD...

Valeri

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Valeri Galtsev
Sr System Administrator
Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics
Kavli Institute for Cosmological Physics
University of Chicago
Phone: 773-702-4247
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++