Bug 233989

Summary:	FreeBSD-12.0-RELEASE-amd64-disc1.iso too big for 700MB cdrom
Product:	Base System	Reporter:	Laurent Frigault <freebsdbugzilla>
Component:	misc	Assignee:	freebsd-bugs (Nobody) <bugs>
Status:	New ---
Severity:	Affects Many People	CC:	freebsdbugzilla, fuz, hostmaster, naito.yuichiro
Priority:	---
Version:	12.0-RELEASE
Hardware:	amd64
OS:	Any

Description Laurent Frigault 2018-12-13 18:22:58 UTC

After downloading FreeBSD-12.0-RELEASE-amd64-disc1.iso to burn a CDROM I discover that it is far too big for CDROM capacity 851MB!

 871808 -rw-r--r--  1 lolo  wheel   892467200 Dec 12 17:51 FreeBSD-12.0-RELEASE-amd64-disc1.iso

I had to burn a DVD and if a dvd is needed, the dvd1 iso is more interesting.
this make the amd64 disk1 iso useless.

Comment 1 Glen Barber freebsd_committer

2018-12-13 18:58:26 UTC

This is known for 12.0.  There was nothing that could have been excluded from the disc1.iso image to reduce the size, while keeping the 'Live CD' mode useful for system recovery.

Comment 2 Conrad Meyer freebsd_committer

2018-12-13 19:50:24 UTC

100-pack CD-R: $14 [1]

100-pack DVD-R: $14.59 [2]

DVDs are so cheap just from an absolute standpoint (much less $/GB) that I'm not sure CDs make any sense anymore.  Perhaps we should just retire "CD"-specific media entirely.

[1]: https://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&N=-1&IsNodeId=1&Description=100%20pack%20CD-R&bop=And&Order=PRICE&PageSize=96

[2]: https://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&N=-1&IsNodeId=1&Description=100%20pack%20DVD-R&bop=And&Order=PRICE&PageSize=96

Comment 3 Yuichiro NAITO 2018-12-14 03:46:01 UTC

(In reply to Conrad Meyer from comment #2)
I think we should update our Handbook '2.3.1. Prepare the Installation Media' chapter to use DVD.

https://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/handbook/bsdinstall-pre.html

Comment 4 hostmaster 2018-12-16 20:56:40 UTC

It might be possible to provide zfs-based FreeBSD .iso images with lz4 compression enabled on creation - this would probably cut image sizes in half or thereabouts

Comment 5 Robert Clausecker 2019-01-10 15:13:22 UTC

I don't think ZFS-based boot media are a good idea: CD images are likely used on old systems that won't have enough RAM for ZFS anyway.  How about using geom_uzip(4) to compress the base system instead?  This might make the set up a bit more complicated though.