Re: Cleaning up disks from prior installs

[Martin Husemann <martin%duskware.de@localhost>]

On Wed, Jul 24, 2024 at 12:28:27PM -0500, Will Senn wrote:
> I'm not yet entirely clear on netbsd's approach to partitioning. I have my
> T430 set to UEFI only, no CSM. I have noticed that during installation,
> sticking to GPT, I have issues with the disk provisioning steps that are
> baffling. The solution I've found to be repeatable and dependable is to boot
> into linux mint's live usb, run gdisk and zap the gpt and mbr partitions on
> the disks then the install never fails. Since I'm trying to dedicate the
> laptop to netbsd, this seems less clean than I'd like. I took a look around
> and can't find any netbsd way of zapping the drives that's quick and
> dependable, leaving no effective trace of whatever might have been there
> (not like zeroing out the whole disk). Is there a "delete partitions and
> signatures from a drive" utility that's on the install media that I can run
> before doing a clean install?

I sysinst before you get to the partitioning step, there is an option
that goes like:

       +----------------------------------------------------------------+       
       x What would you like to do?                                     x       
       x                                                                x       
       x>a: Set sizes of NetBSD partitions                              x       
       x b: Use default partition sizes                                 x       
       x c: Manually define partitions                                  x       
       x d: Delete everything, use different partitions (not disklabel) x       
       x x: Cancel                                                      x       
       +----------------------------------------------------------------+       



Just ignore the "(not disklabel)" part of option (d) [which probably
says "not GPT" in your case], select that option and it will wipe your
current partitions, ask you what partitioning type you would like
to use instead, where you can just select GPT again, and you get back
to the same screen shown above.

Martin