# Installing FreeBSD from cd troubles



## JoshuaBranson (Jul 19, 2011)

I downloaded the FreeBSD*disc1.iso, burned it, and booted my Mac Book Pro 7,1 with it. When I got to the partition step of the installation, the cd couldn't find my hard drive. It said to check the "FreeBSD 8.2-RELEASE Hardware Notes" for tips. Where would that document list which hard drives FreeBSD would support and how would I find out what hard drive I have?


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## SirDice (Jul 20, 2011)

The short answer is that the FreeBSD sysinstall doesn't recognize GPT.

http://wiki.freebsd.org/AppleMacbook


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## JoshuaBranson (Jul 20, 2011)

Hey, thanks for putting that link in. I tried following that guide you sent me, and being a newbie I got stuck. Fast. So here's what I did.

 I tried doing the "FreeBSD-only Installation with ZFS" as posted in the link you sent me. Here's the catch. I downloaded the "8.0 LiveFS memstick" (which I think is this file: "FreeBSD-8.2-RELEASE-amd64-memstick.img") then I copied it into my USB flash drive (literally copied and pasted), and tried booting up my Mac with it in the flash drive. Long story short: it didn't work. Instead it booted up like it normally does, meaning it tried to boot up a non-working operating system: my Gentoo install, which doesn't boot because my custom built kernel is crap (I'm a newbie remember?).

Anyway, I'd still like to get FreeBSD on my Mac. But I'm gonna need a bit of help...


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## SirDice (Jul 21, 2011)

Are you sure you want to get rid of OS-X? I wouldn't, I like OS-X :e

If OS-X still works you can use it's *dd* to put the image on a stick. Then you can boot from it.


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## JoshuaBranson (Jul 21, 2011)

I already deleted the OS-X on my computer. Mainly because I only want to run on computer on free software. So I can't use OS-X or use "dd". How else can I use the memstick file to create a bootable USB? (I do have a functioning Ubuntu live cd that I can use.)


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## SirDice (Jul 21, 2011)

JoshuaBranson said:
			
		

> (I do have a functioning Ubuntu live cd that I can use.)


That would work too. 

`# dd if=FreeBSD-8.2-RELEASE-amd64-memstick.img of=/dev/da0 bs=10240 conv=sync`

You need to adjust /dev/da0 to the corresponding Linux USB drive name.


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## wblock@ (Jul 21, 2011)

Don't use sync, padding is undesirable for memstick images. 

A larger block size can make it faster.  Note that Linux dd is case sensitive on block sizes, so 64K instead of 64k, 1M instead of 1m.


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## JoshuaBranson (Jul 22, 2011)

Ok, so I tried downloading the memstick.img file using the Ubuntu live cd. Didn't work. I ran out of enough RAM to download it. So using windows on another computer. I burnt the livefs.iso onto a cd, booted, and tried entering fixit, like the guide says to do. Didn't work. I also tried entering fixit with a a disk with the FreeBSD*disc1.iso burnt on it. Didn't work. Both times it said it couldn't find some file and couldn't mount something. I even got bored burnt an a cd with the PC-BSD 64-bit iso on it and tried installing PC-BSD on it. Didn't work. It couldn't boot properly. What now?


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## wblock@ (Jul 22, 2011)

"Didn't work" is not really helpful in diagnosing problems.  But you're encountering problems that are unique to the Mac, and people who know about those details might not be reading this thread because there's nothing about it in the title.  To get better results, please help those trying to help you by giving specific and detailed information.


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