Dual Boot Red Hat / FreeBSD System



  1. One of the most important pieces of the puzzle is capacity planning. Set aside more space for Red Hat if you'd like or just 50/50 it. I like having a /boot, / and swap partitions. For Red Hat, make the /boot partition the only primary partition. Save some unused space for FreeBSD.

  2. Install Red Hat and choose to use the Grub for the boot loader. This took me around 30 minutes with a "User" install.

  3. Next begin the FreeBSD install. Here I just went with system defaults for partitions. Seemed to work fine.


  4. Now, you will have to modify the /etc/grub.conf file on the Red Hat install so the grub menu will present you with the option to boot into FreeBSD. Here's what to do:
    • Put Disk 1 of the FreeBSD install disk set in and reboot.

    • Choose option "Fixit" in the sysinstall Main Menu.

    • Put Disk 1 of the FreeBSD install disk set in and reboot.

    • Figure out what parition the / partition is located on and mount it. I guessed. :o)
      > mount -o rw /dev/ad0s4a /mnt

    • Find out where the rest of the partitions are ... just to know.
      > more /mnt/etc/fstab

    • Remove the FreeBSD disk and reboot to Red Hat.

    • Edit Grub configuration.
      > vi /etc/grub.conf
      Add the following after the Red Hat section (or before to boot to FreeBSD by default) Title FreeBSD 6.2 root (hd0,3,a) 1st drive, 4th disk partition, 1st FreeBSD partition kernel /boot/loader

    • Save file and reboot.

    5. Congratulations! You should now be given the option to choose between the Red Hat and FreeBSD systems in the grub menu.

    Boot to which ever you would like.