From owner-freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Tue Oct 6 19:27:51 2015 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@mailman.ysv.freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:1900:2254:206a::19:1]) by mailman.ysv.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 3C3279D0C69 for ; Tue, 6 Oct 2015 19:27:51 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from freebsd@edvax.de) Received: from mx01.qsc.de (mx01.qsc.de [213.148.129.14]) (using TLSv1 with cipher DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA (256/256 bits)) (Client did not present a certificate) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTPS id 01817AD5 for ; Tue, 6 Oct 2015 19:27:50 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from freebsd@edvax.de) Received: from r56.edvax.de (port-92-195-41-64.dynamic.qsc.de [92.195.41.64]) (using TLSv1 with cipher DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA (256/256 bits)) (No client certificate requested) by mx01.qsc.de (Postfix) with ESMTPS id 0E0E93CD44; Tue, 6 Oct 2015 21:27:41 +0200 (CEST) Received: from r56.edvax.de (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by r56.edvax.de (8.14.5/8.14.5) with SMTP id t96JRfmD002571; Tue, 6 Oct 2015 21:27:41 +0200 (CEST) (envelope-from freebsd@edvax.de) Date: Tue, 6 Oct 2015 21:27:41 +0200 From: Polytropon To: "William A. Mahaffey III" Cc: FreeBSD Questions !!!! Subject: Re: The saga continues Message-Id: <20151006212741.0e128a23.freebsd@edvax.de> In-Reply-To: <5613CA68.6090909@hiwaay.net> References: <5613CA68.6090909@hiwaay.net> Reply-To: Polytropon Organization: EDVAX X-Mailer: Sylpheed 3.1.1 (GTK+ 2.24.5; i386-portbld-freebsd8.2) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.20 Precedence: list List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Tue, 06 Oct 2015 19:27:51 -0000 On Tue, 6 Oct 2015 08:25:06 -0453.75, William A. Mahaffey III wrote: > When I went to reboot, the UEFI 'BIOS' reported > 'missing MBR record' & hung there. Do you have "MBR legacy boot" enabled or forced? When using GPT volumes, one of them has to be a "boot partition". Here you can find a good illustration of the steps involved: http://www.wonkity.com/~wblock/docs/html/disksetup.html#_the_new_standard_gpt By the way, it's more like either "BIOS" _or_ "UEFI". ;-) > There were/are *no* explicit options > to boot from a USB drive, although that worked during the install w/ > virgin HDD's, it came up w/ a very DOS-y screen which listed 'FreeBSD' > as a boot option. That depends on the boot order specified in the UEFI. When a "higher priority" media was found bootable, no other media will be tried. Check in the UEFI setup if you can change the boot order, for example to "USB, optical, HDD". When the disks are empty, a boot attempt won't work, so the UEFI decides to look at other possible boot sources, such as USB sticks or optical media. This step will not be taken when the HDD is "first priority" and is bootable. > Is there > some magic combo of key-strokes to get it to try to boot from the USB > stick anyway ? Depends. If I remember correctly, PF12 during POST (or what it is called like in UEFI) will show a screen to select the boot source. Of course - only if the UEFI manufacturer has implemented this interactive selection. > I want to boot into a shell & zap the 1st 1 GB or so of > each drive & try again, a procedure I had to use early this summer > during a NetBSD install, which *did* work AOK & allowed me to complete a > successful install. A few kB usually are enough - just kill the partition table and the boot loader, located at the beginning of the disk. It will then appear as "empty". :-) -- Polytropon Magdeburg, Germany Happy FreeBSD user since 4.0 Andra moi ennepe, Mousa, ...