PC-BSD Review – 7.1 Galileo Edition

PC-BSD is a Free Operating System which has been designed with the casual user in mind. It is based on FreeBSD and is geared for desktop use by the end user.

Not surprisingly, there are a whole lot of user friendly features found in PC-BSD which make installing and using this operating system a snap.

As of this writing, the latest version of PC-BSD is ver 7.1 (Galileo Edition) and is based on FreeBSD 7.x.

I downloaded the all inclusive PC-BSD DVD ISO image from it’s website and burned it on a blank DVD.

When I booted my computer using the DVD, PC-BSD started booting and after a short while, I was presented with the GUI installer.

The whole installation process is quite simple and straight forward. There are only 7 steps to completing a PC-BSD installation; And anyone who has installed Windows on their machine will be perfectly at home installing PC-BSD.

The following is a video I created of the PC-BSD installation process, from start to finish. Watch and enjoy!

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pfSgW3kXpAU]

You can also watch the same video in High Definition.

PC-BSD 7.1 Main Features

• PC-BSD 7.1 is built upon FreeBSD 7.x. It is not a fork of FreeBSD but is FreeBSD itself with a whole lot of user friendly features thrown in, that are lacking in FreeBSD.
• Installs KDE 4.2 desktop by default.
• Has a unique method of installing packages similar to how you will install software in Windows. These all inclusive packages are called PBIs and contain the necessary files to satisfy all dependencies. Using PBIs, installing packages is as simple as double clicking on them. Uninstalling and updating PBIs is equally simple.
• Comes bundled with a good subset of all the popular open source software which includes, OpenOffice.org 3.1, Firefox 3.5, GIMP 2.6, FileZilla 3.2.4.1, Pidgin IM Client, Wine, and all the KDE utilities. You can find even more software at the PC-BSD PBI repository.
• Adobe Flash player is installed by default. But the player is version 9.x. Similarly Sun Java is available for PC-BSD but needs to be downloaded separately from it’s repository.
• PC-BSD plays almost all the video and audio file formats. But because some codecs are proprietary and have licensing restrictions, they are not bundled with PC-BSD. As mentioned earlier, you can download these codecs separately and install them from their PBI.
• Graphical tools for all system and network administration tasks. This is a big advantage over FreeBSD as this makes it a lot easier for end users to manage their PC-BSD system.
• PC-BSD updates itself automatically. And users can access an Update Manager for all online updates.
• PC-BSD comes bundled with a very good and comprehensive user manual which explains every aspect of using PC-BSD.

PC-BSD 7.1 Galileo Desktop

On the down side, PC-BSD user manual states it currently supports only KDE. But I did find PBI installers for other window managers like Gnome and Enlightenment. I have not yet tried alternate window managers in PC-BSD. If you are an avid Gnome fan, then you may not get the best experience in installing it in PC-BSD because most system and network administration scripts (GUIs) are KDE centric and may not work properly in Gnome. I also found a small glitch in the Update manager which was hanging up after downloading part of the updates. But I guess, that is a temporary glitch.

After working in PC-BSD for some time now, I am really impressed by its stability and ease of use .  PC-BSD no doubt has a great role to play in the Desktop arena and has the potential to grab the mind share of many casual computer users.

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