Dangerously dedicated mode with FreeBSD 10.1

[Warren Block]

On Fri, 21 Nov 2014, Rostislav Krasny wrote:

> Hi,
>
> I've a server with FreeBSD 7.4-STABLE that uses two phisical disks in
> a so called "dangerously dedicated mode". There is no other operating
> system and no plan to install anything else but FreeBSD. So in my case
> this is not dangerous mode at all.
>
> I want to upgrade it by installing FreeBSD 10.1 from scratch and I
> want to use the dedicated disk mode again. How could I do that?
>
> If I understand it right the new bsdinstall(8) doesn't support the
> dedicated disk mode, the old sysinstall(8) is already dead and the
> only solution is a manual disk partitioning from shell. The 2.6.5.
> Shell Mode Partitioning section of the Handbook is very terse about
> that.

If you are determined, it should be possible to select a bsdlabel-only 
format with the Manual partitioning option in the menus, or enter Shell 
mode on startup and create it with gpart or even bsdlabel.  That said, 
I can't think of any advantages of using a bare bsdlable at all.  With 
10.1, GPT is available, supports large disks, and is easily alignable.*

*: although it is reported that bsdinstall for 10.1 does not 
automatically do 4K alignment.  But at least there are advantages to 
using it as a partition scheme.