--- title: "FreeBSD 8.1-RELEASE Announcement" sidenav: download --- include::shared/releases.adoc[] Date: {rel81-current-date} ++++

The FreeBSD Release Engineering Team is pleased to announce the availability of FreeBSD 8.1-RELEASE. This is the second release from the 8-STABLE branch which improves on the functionality of FreeBSD 8.0 and introduces some new features. Some of the highlights:

For a complete list of new features and known problems, please see the online release notes and errata list available at:

For more information about FreeBSD release engineering activities please see:

Availability

FreeBSD 8.1-RELEASE is now available for the amd64, i386, ia64, pc98, powerpc, and sparc64 architectures.

FreeBSD 8.1 can be installed from bootable ISO images or over the network. Some architectures (currently amd64 and i386) also support installing from a USB memory stick. The required files can be downloaded via FTP or BitTorrent as described in the sections below. While some of the smaller FTP mirrors may not carry all architectures, they will all generally contain the more common ones such as amd64 and i386.

MD5 and SHA256 hashes for the release ISO images are included at the bottom of this message.

The purpose of the images provided as part of the release are as follows:

dvd1

This contains everything necessary to install the base FreeBSD operating system, a collection of pre-built packages, and the documentation. It also supports booting into a "livefs" based rescue mode. This should be all you need if you can burn and use DVD-sized media.

disc1

This contains the base FreeBSD operating system and the documentation packages for CDROM-sized media. There are no other packages.

livefs

This contains support for booting into a "livefs" based rescue mode but does not support doing an install from the CD itself. It is meant to help rescue an existing system but could be used to do a network based install if necessary.

bootonly

This supports booting a machine using the CDROM drive but does not contain the support for installing FreeBSD from the CD itself. You would need to perform a network based install (e.g. from an FTP server) after booting from the CD.

memstick

This can be written to an USB memory stick (flash drive) and used to do an install on machines capable of booting off USB drives. It also supports booting into a "livefs" based rescue mode. The documentation packages are provided but no other packages.

As one example of how to use the memstick image, assuming the USB drive appears as /dev/da0 on your machine something like this should work:

# dd if="8".1-RELEASE-amd64-memstick.img of=/dev/da0 bs="10240" conv="sync"

Be careful to make sure you get the target (of=) correct.

FreeBSD 8.1-RELEASE can also be purchased on CD-ROM or DVD from several vendors. One of the vendors that will be offering FreeBSD 8.1-based products is:

BitTorrent

8.1-RELEASE ISOs are available via BitTorrent. A collection of torrent files to download the images is available at:

FTP

At the time of this announcement the following FTP sites have FreeBSD 8.1-RELEASE available.

However before trying these sites please check your regional mirror(s) first by going to:

Any additional mirror sites will be labeled ftp2, ftp3 and so on.

More information about FreeBSD mirror sites can be found at:

For instructions on installing FreeBSD, please see Chapter 2 of The FreeBSD Handbook. It provides a complete installation walk-through for users new to FreeBSD, and can be found online at:

Updates from Source

The procedure for doing a source code based update is described in the FreeBSD Handbook:

The branch tag to use for updating the source is RELENG_8_1 for CVS. For SVN use releng/8.1.

FreeBSD Update

The freebsd-update(8) utility supports binary upgrades of i386 and amd64 systems running earlier FreeBSD releases. Systems running 7.[0123]-RELEASE, 8.0-RELEASE, 8.1-BETA1, or 8.1-RC[12] can upgrade as follows:

# freebsd-update upgrade -r 8.1-RELEASE

During this process, FreeBSD Update may ask the user to help by merging some configuration files or by confirming that the automatically performed merging was done correctly.

# freebsd-update install

The system must be rebooted with the newly installed kernel before continuing.

# shutdown -r now

After rebooting, freebsd-update needs to be run again to install the new userland components, and the system needs to be rebooted again:

# freebsd-update install

At this point, users of systems being upgraded from FreeBSD 7.3-RELEASE or earlier will be prompted by freebsd-update to rebuild all third-party applications (e.g., ports installed from the ports tree) due to updates in system libraries.

After updating installed third-party applications (and again, only if freebsd-update printed a message indicating that this was necessary), run freebsd-update again so that it can delete the old (no longer used) system libraries:

# freebsd-update install

Finally, reboot into 8.1-RELEASE:

# shutdown -r now

Support

The FreeBSD Security Team has designated FreeBSD 8.1 an "Extended" support release and currently plans to support FreeBSD 8.1 until July 31, 2012. For more information on the Security Team and their support of the various FreeBSD branches see:

Acknowledgments

Many companies donated equipment, network access, or man-hours to support the release engineering activities for FreeBSD 8.1 including The FreeBSD Foundation, Hewlett-Packard, Yahoo!, NetApp, Internet Systems Consortium, and Sentex Communications.

The release engineering team for 8.1-RELEASE includes:

Ken Smith <kensmith@FreeBSD.org> Release Engineering, amd64, i386, sparc64 Release Building, Mirror Site Coordination
Robert Watson <rwatson@FreeBSD.org> Release Engineering, Security
Konstantin Belousov <kib@FreeBSD.org> Release Engineering
Marc Fonvieille <blackend@FreeBSD.org> Release Engineering, Documentation
Hiroki Sato <hrs@FreeBSD.org> Release Engineering, Documentation
Bjoern Zeeb <bz@FreeBSD.org> Release Engineering
Marcel Moolenaar <marcel@FreeBSD.org> ia64, powerpc Release Building
Takahashi Yoshihiro <nyan@FreeBSD.org> PC98 Release Building
Joe Marcus Clarke <marcus@FreeBSD.org> Package Building
Erwin Lansing <erwin@FreeBSD.org> Package Building
Mark Linimon <linimon@FreeBSD.org> Package Building
Pav Lucistnik <pav@FreeBSD.org> Package Building
Ion-Mihai Tetcu <itetcu@FreeBSD.org> Package Building
Martin Wilke <miwi@FreeBSD.org> Package Building
Colin Percival <cperciva@FreeBSD.org> Security Officer

Trademark

FreeBSD is a registered trademark of The FreeBSD Foundation.

ISO Image Checksums

MD5 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-amd64-bootonly.iso) = e522b6f4af801e40f52d402d937f1886
MD5 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-amd64-disc1.iso) = 644ded0765f68984f2c2d8159e16acd1
MD5 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-amd64-dvd1.iso) = 3dc2f3131c390f3d8312349cd945aa24
MD5 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-amd64-livefs.iso) = 05ef3fb0e60cc0b263f2889f3a31c6c5
MD5 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-amd64-memstick.img) = 2769c3a606d786fa3840bb2937ac75c1
MD5 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-i386-bootonly.iso) = 7266163259fe288f08e3749503c58f73
MD5 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-i386-disc1.iso) = 4ead632b2655ca3bd5fc11f8d0c91a53
MD5 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-i386-dvd1.iso) = 75eb10e7586de1adf793e897ae344eb1
MD5 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-i386-livefs.iso) = 2f245b65923ff37fe5b760515072d8a9
MD5 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-i386-memstick.img) = db63bb7c02fad1cf0d1f2f5c24530c45
MD5 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-ia64-bootonly.iso) = 86ab91535a04cef25dcbe9d8a3f28944
MD5 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-ia64-disc1.iso) = d878a85d9fa3ed50e441222c5ffdbd3d
MD5 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-ia64-disc2.iso) = 206a5b1f00cc640aa7267ab25a8e37e8
MD5 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-ia64-disc3.iso) = c9f36660ad87ff71c95a3a14c4a36683
MD5 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-ia64-dvd1.iso) = 95c32e513c84a54d6b1e741943bb34b3
MD5 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-ia64-livefs.iso) = 76fb856ca73a6ad2b2d683cdbc46f6eb
MD5 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-pc98-bootonly.iso) = 3a8d1d854a389588a6344494ddc7f73c
MD5 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-pc98-disc1.iso) = 647399d13fb24753071b2c1e2c21198b
MD5 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-pc98-livefs.iso) = f7ee871bc4682e54cd365934f16dbd1a
MD5 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-powerpc-bootonly.iso) = 5a1a6ba5034fb6cc387f5ee39abd27fa
MD5 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-powerpc-disc1.iso) = d4cebf352ddd75b8ae288444f1931cd8
MD5 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-powerpc-disc2.iso) = 38a81b33fc22092d8ba851bd1b27ca78
MD5 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-powerpc-disc3.iso) = dc6074506bf4d26a8ae1dd6406883891
MD5 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-sparc64-bootonly.iso) = 7b44be3d8532b76ef1546b432e2af624
MD5 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-sparc64-disc1.iso) = 6a11b5a9bfff83e3833eefe1cac79d69
MD5 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-sparc64-dvd1.iso) = 3432fdb346e2cc00e26a025dbd7a7799
MD5 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-sparc64-livefs.iso) = 5b97fd1d08bb3d0699dc0a054a6a22f8
SHA256 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-amd64-bootonly.iso) = e24c270e1351d259b49a540647beaca88de3a5163371aa41e866fb0bf47ec572
SHA256 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-amd64-disc1.iso) = 2b87563d876cfe6095d1a7fef164d0eb0d63a6a889320b4bb91f138dc29e01e1
SHA256 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-amd64-dvd1.iso) = 5a7f23188bc20c8fbcc3a8d0eb630f2aa445c72d5bf1483c6bc83b17e590b397
SHA256 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-amd64-livefs.iso) = 9e40d4f72c82d8ab47a110ea73a3835f908fc0d5aefdb0dd89bf52775804a6d7
SHA256 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-amd64-memstick.img) = 44400547769fd8d3d4ab8eed09bfb1c0b8a4f4bc403bd2f848ec58963212cb37
SHA256 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-i386-bootonly.iso) = 8e0b4c877c3ae7714656d9ffacbf1b23710f71fe60255e81b902505af29e5ea9
SHA256 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-i386-disc1.iso) = 7b80c34ad0cb49ace8def6261561ab22ab9346c58b69e79a82c148682a62bdc1
SHA256 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-i386-dvd1.iso) = e273a66c370c519fe83711ee20b9a07165c2c3acd24dc3105efd6609ecb0b24f
SHA256 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-i386-livefs.iso) = a446f5572cd711ee3907f17149b5cae4552ba9d4a676a29ee0d8a557304fb787
SHA256 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-i386-memstick.img) = 549800209a67e6b6cfbe93b0cd1289ee7801a53c30ca229e82be14617b2ffa17
SHA256 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-ia64-bootonly.iso) = de4a56a9d02669285e1fdd3fbf4024a3fca427df24acd0663c840ed0d2b6e3aa
SHA256 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-ia64-disc1.iso) = 89747ee7f04fc3949da5ccac71b2cababb3d3be65842e46f1d545e0e6f6f9f94
SHA256 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-ia64-disc2.iso) = b3564cf59e4181ea9a7323f8f372a13a713615d444ccec90dac42d28bc46488a
SHA256 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-ia64-disc3.iso) = 084851c14850ad98bf52e00e49e9c4db90b420c52f6abbd015d7ab478f93ca9c
SHA256 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-ia64-dvd1.iso) = e7a8d16240b1890c24a8e46f5c03a4dec10ebc2ff585e9c2dcceb8bbfe099dc9
SHA256 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-ia64-livefs.iso) = 84910d35b37d03c4ff593de25fe6f0a7a2a5c34ee34d66d0d7d59015d87a19ce
SHA256 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-pc98-bootonly.iso) = 25e345c38d6a606a4363110c58ad5b21ecc8c0d03d1349b13772761d5d2a99be
SHA256 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-pc98-disc1.iso) = b7183eafec116954e5b729878eaa8b9f31af16c84651f9900dfd686f3ceae994
SHA256 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-pc98-livefs.iso) = 436981209a3d34a522f57e73340e9a74d4e28191df743ec2b55b7051d78de04a
SHA256 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-powerpc-bootonly.iso) = 44b3b08f225b863c0e8f5dcd3d54b64ce2a664fee1893377ef504a54b8677e40
SHA256 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-powerpc-disc1.iso) = 0a27021d6c8bad5cd185bbd694a9dcc46eac71b12eb98180cd9d6875323a34d0
SHA256 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-powerpc-disc2.iso) = 8c135cccbfbf260fef62fa2722fa7bbec823aaf76447f90108a4be02a10c79a8
SHA256 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-powerpc-disc3.iso) = de7277e1ad23c8f9a5f2bb979becfb71602ceda89eb7c0dde8838a0f87e07e20
SHA256 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-sparc64-bootonly.iso) = c33ae727ef70ff351fdd09a37afbe1beb5065a10536444af93136993943e1d8c
SHA256 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-sparc64-disc1.iso) = 7f6b9a6bbfd01866dd0a7f305198a38cf66a2a2db5e071557ad45fc1bd77b561
SHA256 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-sparc64-dvd1.iso) = e741cbad4d7c72a6e15bdd84c8e7fcf08767ee269b6f1ae6a036a237fef9ff23
SHA256 (FreeBSD-8.1-RELEASE-sparc64-livefs.iso) = ef5254aad4b1376fd7b0dcc242498aac67d11a9ef32c0d9c2df256e59f370e03

++++