This past week-end I tried to install FreeBSD on my new server. Here's the summary of how it went:
Strike 1 (friday evening)
I deleted all existing partitions on the drive on the 73GB WD Raptor. Then came time to create the partitions as I want them to be.
- 1G /var
- 1G /var/log
- 35G /
- 10G /usr/home
- 2G /tmp
- 8G swap
After reboot, I have a message similar to "kernel not found at /boot/kernel" at boot. So I decide to open the FreeBSD Handbook and read the partitioning section. Turns out FreeBSD requires a boot partition at the start of the disk to put the boot loader.
Strike 2
So I restart the installation, decide to go with GPT and add this boot partition. I thus deleted the whole disk, change partition scheme to GPT recreated the parittions and... got almost the same message. Progress, but the the kind of progress I want. Home run !
Enough of this !
I said to myself. I am now doubting this drive is still good. So I start over and use guided partitioning as the most basic test. This time the server reboots into the friendly FreeBSD boot chooser.
Now I just need to figure out why I can't boot with the partition setup I want.