Installation of GhostBSD 25.02 & 26.1 via USB stick & DVD

hank2121

OK, I tried now several installations of GhostBSD - both 25.02 & 26.1, with xlibre & xorg - on 5 different laptops.

1) Dell Latitude 7470 (sorry: not 7490), Intel i5, Intel UHD graphics (on board) with 8GB RAM, 256GB SSD, Wlan (to be added)

installation worked right from the start via USB-DVD-drive (26.1 tested) and a persistent reFind - (only refind, BSD loader not recognised at all after installation & restart).
With all stick installation attempts (written the "iso-way", one Toshiba, one scandisk, even on different ports) it did not find any bootable devices after a 2nd (!) restart, only a first restart after installation worked, at least with reFind, with secure boot off and on UEFI.
as the wlan chip couldn t be detected or configured, I just tested it with LAN cable and DHCP, which worked out of the box
for wlan, I have to check Ser.No. of Dell again to give exact description of chip model and rev., as only LAN conncetion worked with that Dell model.

will be added in here!

2) Lenovo Thinkpad T520, 8GB RAM, Intel i7 - 2640M, Intel Graphics 2nd gen, Samsung 128GB SSD

with same Toshiba USB-stick, worked out of the box (26.1), with DVD (Matsushita HL-DT-STDVDRAM) and GBSD 25.02-R14-3.p2 (xorg) had to put boot sequence in BIOS on "UEFI & legacy", but UEFI first priority) to get DVD started. From this I upgraded to actual xorg-based 26.1-p8.
For the Toshiba stick it best worked on pure UEFI (BIOS).

Tried then both reFind & BSD-loader. BSD-loader again not working, reFind with Stick rebooted once after installation, then 2nd boot: "no boot device found"; with (internal) DVD, it keeps a persistent reFind,
Then upgraded from 25.02 to 26.1-R15.p8 on xorg-server, which is now running on it with Bash as default (!) shell.

3) Lenovo Thinkpad L14, 2nd generation, AMD Ryzen 5-4500U, 8GB, 256GB SSD and Radeon graphics

both Toshiba USB-stick & GhostBSD USB-DVD (with 26.1-R15.0-p2 xlibre) worked into live-session and with the USB-DVD version also a working/persistent Xfce desktop after reboot with reFind. Toshiba stick not tested with real installation (only live).

4) Lenovo G50-45, 16GB RAM, AMD A6 cpu, Radeon R5 (?) > ToDo!

both Toshiba USB-stick with 26.1 & two DVD with 26.1 & 25.02-R14-3p2 in UEFI mode did not boot into live-session.
Then with Toshiba stick (in BIOS conf. as USB-HDD, as EFI stick conf. in BIOS boot section got no start poss.) it did start into boot process, but then problem: "shell cant be found" and it sugg. to use "/rescue/bin" as path for the shell, which ends in commandshell with "OK" and end of boot process.
Then with mix in BIOS with "UEFI + legacy support" and both DVD versions (25.02R14-3p2 (xorg) & 26.1 (xlibre)) it always ended with a reboot after trying to load support for "AMDGPU".
The only fix installation on this G50 machine was achieved with a FreeBSD 14.3- version via internal DVD.

5) Toshiba Portege R30-A-19E, 8GB RAM, intel 4th gen, core i5, intel UHD graphics, 256GB SSD

installation with both 25.02 R14-3.p2 (xorg) and 26.1 (xlibre) on internal DVD went well. With xlibre until p5, then with upgrade on version p8 it seems to rely on zsh as default. I always changed (till then) default shell via "passwd" to Bash, but then got stuck in login-screen. I also may have used wrong VirtualBox-packages under xlibre (the one with xorg-supprt for VB-additions), then again stuck on login-screen with no mouse & keyboard.
I tested now last installation with Toshiba stick (GhostBSD 26.1 ...) as live medium and did a fix installation of GhostBSD 26.1 DVD version with xlibre (internal drive) and with the latter have now achieved a persistent reboot with both reFind & BSD-loader, and kept the latter now on my Toshiba Portege.

so used:
Toshiba & sandisk ultra flair 3.0 as stick with GhostBSD 26.1-R15.0-p2 and
DVD+R with GhostBSD 25.02-R14-3p2 (xorg) + 25.02-R14-3p2 (xlibre) +
GhostBSD 26.1-R15.0.p2 as installation versions

hank2121

but as a "final conclusion" on Your thoughts, @vimanuelt I d agree on that "inconsistent UEFI handling" and that a "full disc configuration" with reFind as boot manager is the most stable solution, maybe one with BSD-loader may work as well, depending on the hardware, where it s installed on.

vimanuelt

hank2121
Thanks for the feedback. I am sure it will take time to resolve all these issues. My preference would be to focus testing on hardware from 2018 onward, as that is likely to benefit the largest number of users. While some older systems continue to work well, they often require additional effort to support and troubleshoot. In addition, aging hardware presents its own challenges: plastics become brittle, batteries wear out, and replacement parts become harder to find. In 2026, hardware from 2018 to 2024 appears to offer the best balance of support, reliability, maintainability, and user relevance.

hank2121

vimanuelt alright, I ll see what I can find. BTW: that Dell 7470 is from may 2016. and that wireless chipset in it is a Intel wireless dual AC 8260 to complete info.
But You re right: between 2018/2019 and 2025 is the best range to get GhostBSD 26.x tested under recent conditions of usage. I ll see, if I can find a newer model in our portefeulle, that meets these criteria.

hank2121

last info on wlan chip in Dell 7470: Intel dual wireless ac 8265

hank2121

alright, managed to get a grip on a Dell Latitude 7490 from mid 2019.
Hope, this is a bit more recent to test GhostBSD with.
I tried an initial installation first, with whole disk, BSD loader and Xfce with xlibre & greybird/elementary-theme with upgrades to latest GhostBSD 26.1-R15.x.p8
Funny thing was: the installation via UEFI and deactivated secure boot didnt work from the right-wing USB ports, stick not recognized, but out of the box from the left side.
And the same Intel dual wifi ac8265 wlan chip worked out of the box as well this time, that did not work on the 7470 latitude, only LAN was available.
The Intel UHD 620 graphics works without flaws as well for now.
Anything, that could be interesting to check for anyone? just let me know, I ll have that device for a couple of weeks maybe...

miscreant

I am always interested in the sound hardware....

can you plug in headphones and the sound switches from speakers?

can you get sound out if you run the hdmi out into a tv?

Cool thanks

hank2121

miscreant hi. I m sorrz, I hope, it s no urgent task.
We are on our way to Norway and will be back in two weeks. Then I can test, whatever You want.
Sorry, it was so quiet in here lately, I didn t expect now something. :-)

miscreant

Hey hello. No worries, no rush at all. Thanks for reply. I am always happy to learn and find out about sound with BSD, so it is just a general asking. Safe and happy travels to Norway.