Installing FreeBSD on my NAS

calendar 2012-01-13 · 2 min read · freebsd  ·
Share on: linkedin copy

Using the new bsdinstall works like a charm :-) Thanks!

I want a very small install - no doc, no games, no lib32, no src (I'm ok with the prebuilt kernels).

So I just selected ports - I want to be able to add ports.

It turns out that after boot I needed to install the following ports (with their dependencies):

  • bash
  • screen
  • sudo
  • portupgrade

Back in November 2009 I installed my NAS with the newest FreeBSD: 8.0. I made some choices about partitioning that I now want to redo.

My initial partitioning was

  • / had around 4.5 GB
  • /tmp had around 0.5 GB
  • /var had around 3 GB
  • /home had around 895 GB

And back then I actually decided that the 2 GB RAM in the server was enough, so I didn't have a swap partition :-/

First - having no swap is bad when the server is very busy! And for home use there is no need to separate /tmp and /var from /. And last - the / partition was way too small. I was having trouble using ports all the time, and need to clean up very often...

So I found a new HD for the new boot disk. Luckily I had a WD Caviar Green 1TB with 64 MB cache. Perfect!

I settled for the following partitioning

  • / has around 39 GB
  • /home has around 873 GB
  • And swap has 4 GB