PC-BSD 9.0 Isotope Released!

I just saw this today!!! PC-BSD 9.0 has been released! I didn't know about this, but today, I was looking up something on PC-BSD, and went to the main site, and saw that almost a week ago, they released it!

For those of you who don't know much about PC-BSD; PC-BSD is FreeBSD, but with a paint job, and some very easy to use tools, and Drivers and everything, are loaded up and ready to use out of the box with a default install.

I'm running PC-BSD 8.2 (Based on FreeBSD 8.2) right now on one of my machines, and have had no real issues with it at all, and I like it a lot.

This new release, is based on FreeBSD 9.0-RELEASE, and I'm downloading it right now!

I'm getting a great speed too; I'm grabbing the 32-bit CD version, and, well, it just now popped up telling me it's finished!

I got about 2,000 KBs a second the WHOLE time.

If you'd like to check PC-BSD out, and learn more, go here:

http://www.pcbsd.org/

If you'd like to see the downloads section, just look here:

http://www.pcbsd.org/get-it/download-pc-bsd-isotope

You have a LOT of options for using it, in fact, this is what you'll see on the downloads section:

DVD 64-Bit
DVD 32-Bit
USB BootOnly 32-Bit
USB BootOnly 64-Bit
USB Live 32-Bit
USB Live 64-Bit
VMware disk image 32-Bit
VMware disk image 64-Bit
VirtualBox disk 32-Bit
VirtualBox disk 64-Bit
CD 64-bit
CD 32-bit
Live DVD 64-Bit
Live DVD 32-Bit
USBLITE 64-Bit
USBLITE 32-Bit
USB 64-Bit
USB 32-Bit

That's quite a few options. Most of my machines are 32-bit, so I simply grabbed the 32-bit CD. I could have gotten the DVD, but we're a little low on those, and I have CDs, so, I decided to grab that.

It really doesn't matter much anyway, because when you install PC-BSD, it actually will let you install more stuff it can grab over the Internet.

This new version apparently has a HUGE list of new features. I won't post them all here because you can read most of it right on the site anyway.

Anyway, I highly recommend this to ANYONE who wants to use BSD, but wants a Desktop System.

If you want a Server to set up, or you already are a FreeBSD user, then FreeBSD is good. I currently have FreeBSD 9.0 installed on my BSD workstation, and my Laptop.

I use BSD quite a bit. Actually, some of you may find this odd, but as of right now, I'm using BSD on almost everything.... I have Slackware Linux 12.0 installed on my FTP Server, with a 236 day current uptime, since 12.0 doesn't have much in terms of Kernel updates, which means, I have a fully patched Server running, and I don't need to reboot because, well, installing patches on Unix based stuff, only really needs a reboot if you mess with the Kernel.

Anyway, PC-BSD is in fact FreeBSD, with a very nice paint job, and some custom applications that make installing software a point and click experience. The PBI system PC-BSD has it great.

And, of course, since it IS FreeBSD with just a paint job and some easy to use custom applications, you also have access to the FreeBSD Ports Collection.

The Software Manager is VERY easy to use; You click on it, open it, give the root password, and then go through a list of categories and click on whatever you want installed.

Now, of course, every once in a while, a download does fail and says to try again later, and, to date, that doesn't happen very often, and when it does, I'll usually just try again a few days later, and it works fine!

So, give this a try!

Downloaded, will be playing with this over the next couple of weeks.

As some of you might know I have quite some FreeBSD experience so I don't think I can ever speak for the real target audience but so far it seems very user friendly!
Except for the site, is it me or is the download page plain broken as in I can't see the download link unless I use firebug and the likes.
And that on Firefox and Chrome . . weird, sent them a msg with screenshots.

Thx for pointing me to this, Gore.

No problem; Figured after dragging your ass back here from facebook I'd give you a new toy lol. I used Opera personally on the page, and it did work for me, but it may have just been they were doing something. They seem pretty good about keeping up with issues as they arise from what I've seen over the last few months.

Yep, download pages work like a charm now.
Been playing with the live usb for a bit. Damn nice. .
Now to clean up my laptop and install this baby :D

Bit sad they don't have a PPC port for my Quad G5 though ;)

I told you it was. As for your Port, in theory, you COULD switch a few things and make it run on that ;) The PPC Arch isn't exactly unknown if you know what I mean lol. And I think after 10 years you do.

I have freeBSD running on that 1KW beast, with a simple desktop and all that.
So you got that right ;)
Using it for day to day things, just isn't worth having the whole buildings lights darken in the end I think ;)
Still one hell of a machine which I do use when I have to :D

Hell if this turns out to be worth it, I might even become their PPC porting guy ;)

You you know I met Marshall Kirk McKusick right? HE would also be able to Port it. Hell he's the one who wrote the File System we use to this day lol. He's seriously awesome too, and VERY nice.

But anyway, I think you'll see after about a week of use, that PC-BSD, is the future in Open Desktop OSs; Not Ubuntu.

I made the Prediction, and I don't do that very often, because you're basically putting your reputation on the line saying "this will probably happen in the future" and I rarely do that, except once in a GREAT while.

But, after the last two months I've been sort of toying with PC-BSD more seriously, I can't help but too think that way. I mean I have OLD versions of PC-BSD here I had never used; Along with DesktopBSD, and the like; Because I have a HUGE CD/DVD Case that I use for my BSD stuff, and I haven't ever thrown any away, so I have FreeBSD going back to 4.0!

I have the paid version of FreeBSD you got when you bought the BSD PowerPak, and I bought it in 2000 or so, and it came with 4.0 on 4 CDs, and the 6 CD toolkit, and "The Complete FreeBSD" 3rd Edition book. I've still got the CDs, the book, I still read it, and I still have the box it came in.

So I don't throw any BSD stuff away; Mostly because you CAN in theory still use it today, and upgrade to newer ****. I could in theory install 4.0 on an old Desktop, which is mainly what I have; I only have ONE new Desktop, the rest of my gear is getting dated, but I could install 4.0, upgrade to 5 or so, maybe 6, then, upgrade to 7.x, and from there 8 or 9.

Plus I like looking at the old Docs it came with, and seeing what's changed and how it's changed over the years.

I still have PC-BSD 9 on my Laptop, and it's going good, and I still have 8.2 on my Compaq, because I don't feel a need to upgrade that one either; And of course, there's another reason:

I have this DVD Rip, of something called "Nine Inch Nails, and the Industrial Uprising" and, I used to watch it ALL the time on Windows 7, but now, it won't work.... It juts STOPPED working.... I watched it last time on THIS machine, in Windows, with Windows Media Player, and now, Windows Media Player, RealPlayer, and DivX Player, won't play it. It just won't work for some reason....

But on PC-BSD, with NO 3D because that machine has an on board shitty Video Card, it works out of the box!

So yea I was like WTF lol.

Oh, and, if you'd like; I'll help you out with the Porting; All you need to do, is buy me a PPC machine (I personally love PPC Processors but I've never owned one) and of course teach me C ;)

Then again, in theory, you could probably borrow some stuff from NetBSD to make it work on almost anything; I mean despite how much people say "NetBSD, OpenBSD, FreeBSD, PC-BSD, DesktopBSD, DragonFly BSD, are all somewhat different" when it comes down to it, the differences, really aren't huge. Lol, I think you probably know that more or better than I do. NetBSD and OpenBSD are directly related, as is everything from FreeBSD, which is all coming from 386/BSD which in turn was Net/2 and so on. You can trace their History back to the CSRG.

From what I understand; NFS support in ALL versions of BSD, is still the SAME one a guy in Guelph did while it was still being worked on at the University of California at Berkeley.