PXE Installation
From SoL 25 Wiki
Contents |
[edit] Introduction
If one or more of the following statements do apply to you...
- You don't want to plug a screen to your designated server machine
- You don't want to waste one of these expensive blank DVDs (duh!)
- The server machine does not have a DVD drive
- You want to install multiple machines at once without running around
- You are just curious to see it :)
...the SoL 25 network installation will come and save you!
[edit] Requirements
The machine(s) where you want to install SoL 25 requires a network card that features a PXE stack. Make sure you enable PXE booting in the system's BIOS. In case your network card does not natively support PXE, you may have luck with the Etherboot CD or floppy images. You don't have to download them, since we provide these already on the DVD (image) in the directory contrib/etherboot.
Just write the image that corresponds to your network card to a CD (.iso) or floppy (.zdsk), insert it into the target machine, and it should now be able to boot via PXE. Of course, the BIOS needs to be configured so that it may boot via CD or floppy.
You will need another machine that will be the PXE server. It needs a physical network connection to the target machine(s), and the SoL 25.00 ISO image (a SoL 25 DVD will work as well) ready.
Make sure your firewall(s) are setup properly, and neither DHCP nor TFTP are blocked.
[edit] Set up the PXE Server
The network installation works with both Win32 and Linux being the PXE server, we provide binaries for both operating systems.
[edit] Linux as PXE Server
- Insert the DVD into the designated PXE server machine and mount it somewhere, e.g.
mount /dev/cdrom /mnt/cdrom
Alternatively, you can mount the ISO image using the loopback device, e.g.mount -t iso9660 -o loop /path/to/SoL-25.00.iso /mnt/loop
- Go to the "bin" directory of the DVD
- Start the server:
./PXE-linux.sh eth0 start
(depending on your configuration, you may need to replace "eth0" with the appropriate device)- The default virtual address for the PXE server is 172.25.0.1, the default DHCP IP range for the target machine(s) is 172.25.0.2-172.25.0.100.
[edit] Windows as PXE Server
- Insert the DVD into designated PXE server machine, or mount the ISO image to a virtual drive (e.g. using Daemon Tools).
- Go to the "bin" directory on the DVD and start "PXE-win32.exe" (if a firewall popup appears, confirm)
- Click on "Settings" at the bottom and choose "PXE Compatibility"
- Check the IP settings and edit them if necessary
[edit] Booting the Target Machine(s)
When the PXE server is up and running, connect ALL network devices of the target machine(s) to the network where the PXE server resides. Power on the target machine(s) and select "Boot from network" (or "Boot from CD/DVD" (or floppy), if you use the Etherboot images) if necessary. If the PXE booting succeeds, you may then select "Install SoL 25.00" from the Boot Menu. Although, if the target machine(s) are set up correctly so they boot automatically from PXE, you don't have to do anything, the installer will start automatically.
Like in DVD installation mode, the installer needs a bit to be started, meanwhile check your logs to see which IP got assigned to the target machine(s). When the installer is up and running on the target machine(s), start up a browser and connect to the target machine(s). E.g. if the IP address 172.25.0.2 was assigned to your target machine, use the URL http://172.25.0.2. You will then see the welcome screen of the installer, as if you were sitting in front of the target machine itself.
The remaining steps of the installation work like they do in DVD installation mode.
Make sure you turn off the PXE (DHCP) server (or the PXE booting capability of the target machine) when you want to start the target machine. Note that the installation in network mode will take longer than a local installation from DVD since it is necessary to get the data to the target machine via TFTP first (also, the TFTP protocol provides limited speed only).
