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Date:      Mon, 21 Jul 2003 18:16:15 -0400 (EDT)
From:      Ted Unangst <tedu@zeitbombe.org>
To:        freebsd-questions@freebsd.org
Subject:   trouble installing
Message-ID:  <Pine.BSO.4.53-CIS.0307211755430.591@af.pbqrshfvbavf.pbz>

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I tried to install FreeBSD 5.1 today, and ran into several issues.
Machine in question is a generic AMD 1500 with 1GB RAM and 80GB IDE disk
running OpenBSD.  I'm attempting to install a small setup, just for quick
testing.

prep:
Downloaded floppy images and base sets to a FAT32 partition,
/mnt/freebsd in openbsd.
made floppies, rebooted.

installation:
boots fine, comes up into sysintall.  i choose normal installation.
fdisk goes fine.  i created a 1GB partition.  it's ad0s2

i have enough RAM, i'd rather not use swap.  disklabel defaulted to 120MB
/, 512MB swap, 100MB var and tmp, and 80MB /usr i think.  Now I know
FreeBSD isn't going to fit in 80MB /usr.  So delete it all, and just
create 1GB /.

Next it asks me where to install from.  I want to install from local disk,
a FAT32 partition.  I choose localdisk from the menu, and it asks me,
where is this mounted?  umm, it's not mounted yet.  i just enter
/mnt/freebsd

Go on, pick basic sets, and say yes, ready to install.  Then a box pops
up, telling me i can't install without swap.  i go back, create 200MB
swap, 800MB /, and try again.  this time the error message is can't find
device node /dev/ad0s2b to create swap.

escape to emergency shell.  this is pretty rough, there's no ls.  but
using echo *, i can tell that yes, the only /dev entries for ad0s2 are
ad0s2a and ad0s2c.  there's also no mount or mount_msdos command.

at this point i'm stuck.  i went back through, and tried a few more times
using custom install.  every time its the same.  if i don't create swap,
it refuses to go forward.  if i do create swap, it complains about missing
/dev/ad0s2b.  even if i tricked it into letting me past, how do i specify
that base sets are on the localdisk, in a DOS partition?

1.  why do i need to create a swap partition?  (i can deal with it, just a
little extra aggravation.)
2.  why does sysinstall pick disklabel values that clearly can't work?
3.  why is there no /dev/ad0s2b node?  how do i create it, since i
need a swap partition?
4.  what do i enter into the file system box?  the DOS partition isn't
mounted, and i have no idea how to mount it.

Thanks for help, and I hope I've given enough information.

-- 
so what do you want
you want to be famous and rich and happy
but you're terrified you have nothing to offer this world



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