# Install source - FreeBSD or PC-BSD DVD?



## mechanic (Aug 15, 2010)

The PC-BSD GUI installer offers the choice of KDE or text install to the basic FreeBSD system. What are the pro's and con's of using this compared to the downloadable FreeBSD CD/DVD? I have a version of both installed on different machines and some of the files look rather different, so I wonder what the differences really are. Certainly the installer for PC-BSD is easier to use!


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## phoenix (Aug 15, 2010)

The FreeBSD installer currently only supports installing to bare drive partitions using UFS.

The PC-BSD installer supports UFS, ZFS, and I believe gmirror.  There are plans to incorporate pretty much all of the GEOM options.

For installing FreeBSD, the end result (installed OS) is the same.  How it gets installed, though, is different.

So, you have to ask yourself whether or not you need more than UFS on disk partitions.  If you do, then use the PC-BSD installer.


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## gcooper@ (Aug 15, 2010)

Caveat emptor: once you install with the PCBSD media, you can't use the FreeBSD install media without first wiping the first and last sectors of the disk. This is a known issue with sysinstall not fully supporting gpt slicing ala geom(4).


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