On 12/08/2005, at 6:23 AM, Maude User wrote:
Hello --
I recently installed FreeBSD 5.3 on my laptop and now I want to
install it
onto a rackmount server (hardware specs below).
I hate to ask a silly question but here goes: Do I need to get a
USB CD-ROM
drive (and keyboard and monitor) for the server in order to install
FreeBSD...
or is there some way I can install onto the rackmount server from
the laptop?
(There's no CD-ROM on the rackmount server, but the laptop has a CD-
RW/DVD+-RW.)
It is possible your BIOS will actually direct display to a serial
console.. I'm not sure if
yours does, so if it doesn't you will probably need a keyboard/
monitor if you want
to configure your BIOS, of course if you are happy with the defaults
you should be
able to do it all with a laptop or other system..
You will want to set your boot floppies to use the serial console,
which you can
read about doing here:
http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/handbook/install-
advanced.html
You will need a null modem cable to do this, also you will need to
make sure the
cable is plugged into si0 on the server (com1).. I noticed that the
server has an LCD
display which is possibly driven via a serial port, this could occupy
si0 already.. Getting
it to boot the serial console on a different port to si0 is more
complex, so hopefully
you won't have to..
From this point on the laptop will act like the keyboard and monitor
for the system and
you can install.. I would recommend using an NFS mount on your local
network to install
the files from since it would be the fastest (without installing a CD
drive), otherwise use
ftp, which will be pretty slow (depending on your internet
connection) but the only other
viable method for you really..
Let me know if you have any queries, it is usually pretty straight
forward though =)
_______________________________________________
freebsd-questions@freebsd.org mailing list
http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions
To unsubscribe, send any mail to "[EMAIL PROTECTED]"
