Official Arch BSD Install Guide

NOTE: The MBR instructions is not fully tested and should be considered invalid.

Download

You can download the latest PacBSD ISO from https://packages.pacbsd.org/iso/.

Installation

Once the PacBSD install cd is booted you may wish to change your keyboard layout by using the following command:

kbdmap

You can also use vidcontrol to change your console resolution, to see a list of available modes:

vidcontrol -i mode

You can get a list of the mode numbers to use in setting the resolution to whatever the mode number matches:

vidcontrol MODE_XXX

where XXX is the mode number.

Setting up your disks

The following example is for the simplest setup.

To partition your disk with gpart the simplest way is the following:

For SATA drives the naming will be adaX, while for IDE/PATA it will be daX. Keep in mind this for the following commands:

Warning: replace da0 with the correct drive-identifier for your system!! Failing to do so might irreplacably destroy your data!!

GPT-based systems

Create the geom

gpart create -s gpt da0
gpart add -s 64k -t freebsd-boot da0

Setup a swap:

gpart add -s 1g -t freebsd-swap da0

Setup a root partition.

gpart add -t freebsd-ufs da0

gpart bootcode -b /boot/pmbr -p /boot/gptboot -i 1 da0

newfs -U -j -L root /dev/da0p3

swapon /dev/da0p2

Create the mount-point:

mkdir -p /mnt/arch

Then finish by mounting the partitions to install:

mount /dev/da0p3 /mnt/arch

MBR-based systems

Create the geom:

gpart create -s mbr da0

Create a BSD-geom

gpart add -t freebsd da0

((assuming it returns da0s1))

gpart create -s BSD da0s1

First root partition:

gpart add -s 10G -t freebsd-ufs da0s1

Then setup a swap:

gpart add -s 1g -t freebsd-swap da0s1

newfs -U -j -L root /dev/da0s1a

swapon /dev/da0s1b

Setup the bootloader:

gpart bootcode -b /boot/boot0 da0
gpart bootcode -b /boot/boot da0s1

If you want to use FreeBSDs bootloader as the primary bootloader

gpart set -a active -i 1 da0

Create the mount-point:

mkdir -p /mnt/arch

If you can not create the "/mnt/arch" directory, because the system is in read-only mode, you can create "/tmp/arch" OR simply use /mnt:

mkdir -p /tmp/arch

Then finish by mounting the partitions to install:

mount /dev/da0s1a /mnt/arch

Installing base

Once your disks are ready we can use pacstrap to install the PacBSD base.

At this point you will need the internet to fetch the packages. You can use dhclient for this:

TIP : To find the available network devices, use ifconfig

dhclient device

And fetch the base with:

pacstrap /mnt/arch base

Configure your system

Chroot into your newly installed system to configure it.

chroot /mnt/arch

You'll need to manually setup your fstab at this point. Use either vi or ee for writing it.

Example of a line for swap in fstab:

/dev/da0p2      none        swap   sw 0 0
/dev/da0p3      /           ufs    rw 1 1

If the file is missing please create the file with:

touch /etc/fstab

Setting up your timezone:

ln -s /usr/share/zoneinfo/Europe/London /etc/localtime

Setting up your hostname:

echo 'HOSTNAME="hostname"' > /etc/conf.d/hostname

If you are using the freebsd-init system:

Create the rc.conf file.

sysrc hostname="hostname" 

If you're installing on MBR you have to tell freebsd-bootloader what partition to boot:

echo 'vfs.root.mountfrom="ufs:/dev/ufs/root"' >> /boot/loader.conf

Setup your password:

passwd

Logout of the chroot.

logout

Unmount the root drive.

umount /mnt/arch

Reboot the system.

reboot