# How to decide the partition scheme?



## Toolforger (Feb 29, 2020)

The 12.1 installer offers me various partition schemes.
Unfortunately, the handbook describes a different list than what I see.
And it doesn't describe how to find out which one it should be, so I'm out of luck.

I see these options:

GPT (BIOS)
GPT (UEFI)
GPT (BIOS+UEFI)
MBR (BIOS)
GPT + Active (BIOS)
GPT + Lenovo Fix (BIOS)

I have a Proliant Microserver 8.

Advice appreciated, thanks!


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## Lamia (Feb 29, 2020)

GPT (BIOS+UEFI)

For legacy systems that only support BIOS boot-only and UEFI for new systems with EFI (+BIOS) support. If you install FreeBSD using the installer (Bsdinstall) with Auto ZFS option, it will come with both boot options - BIOS and UEFI. Legacy or old systems will only boot-up the OS from the gpt bios partition. For new systems that want to use UEFI, you can set UEFI as your choice in the mobo setup. There are a few options there - BIOS, UEFI, Both/Dual.


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## Toolforger (Feb 29, 2020)

Actually I was using the Auto ZFS option.
Even with Auto ZFS, you still have to do a few settings (stripe/mirror/RAID, what disk to use, etc.), and partition type is among them.

BTW the default is GPT (BIOS), so one should probably switch it.

Experimental results:
GPT (BIOS) does boot for me. I'm not sure whether the Proliant machines have a BIOS setting that switches between BIOS and UEFI mode, so YMMV.
I probably won't investigate much more; my actual goal here is to set up a running NAS, and getting FreeBSD to boot is just an annoying detail I have to deal with. (Turns out the problems I was having was a flaky USB stick which works fine on my Linux machine but the Proliant machine doesn't like it very much, or maybe FreeBSD is less robust in dealing with intermittent errors... whatever.)


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