PXE boot/install of FreeNAS8?

[tomknight]

Hi,

I've been trying to get FreeNAS8 to install from my local PXE boot server. I already have CentOS and OpenBSD installing from there, so I know the DHCP and TFTP side of things is fine.

I'm just trying to avoid using any local CD or USB device as installation media; I know this works find, it's just not my plan

I've read a whole load of docco on PXE for FreeBSD, e.g.:
http://jdc.parodius.com/freebsd/pxeboot_serial_install_8.html
http://mark-oshea.blogspot.com/2009/11/installing-freebsd-8-using-pxe-and-nfs.html

I get my pxeboot file loaded, and the NFS server has a whole load of files retrieved from it, which is fine. My problem is that if I use the memroot.ufs.gz that's on the CD the program expects to find a CD or USB key with a root filesystem on it, which is exactly what I'm not going to supply.

So, before I start flooding the forum with tons of output, a quick question: has anyone here done this before, or am I venturing into unchartered waters?

Many thanks,

Tom.

 

[dw5304]

well did it for u tom, and any one else here is a pxe installer just tell it to load memdisk and then this iso. It will automaticly download it from sourceforge. for 8.0.2.

https://dc414.org/~dw5304/freenas64.iso

 

[ProtoSD]

That seems like a lot of unnecessary effort to download it from sourceforge every time you want to boot FreeNAS. Why can't your script look on the local disk for the image and get it from there?

 

[dw5304]

because every time i did i got a kernel panic. so i gave up on that this way it will allways be current :).

also this is not for live its for installing freenas to local hdd's we run a repair shop and some times its nice not to have to worry about burning a disk or using a physical system to do this. Just boot from the network select os version and drive u want to install to and go have some lunch and when u come back its all setup and running :).

 

[tomknight]

That's very cool, thanks!

I'll try to work on a local disk version, but I've now got my key systems running and are happy with them (I just have spare USB keys floating round with the OS on).