Skip site navigation (1)Skip section navigation (2)
Date:      Sat, 10 Aug 2002 14:55:02 +1000
From:      Mark Hannon <markhannon@optusnet.com.au>
To:        hackers@freebsd.org
Subject:   HOWTO: Upgrade w/o floppy or cd to bootstrap
Message-ID:  <3D549CA6.29734446@optusnet.com.au>

next in thread | raw e-mail | index | archive | help
Hi,

I recently decided to upgrade my network firewall which is headless.
Last time I had a monitor attached I had set the BIOS to boot only
CD-ROM and then hard-disk.  This presented me with a problem to 
perform a serial-console installation.  (The handbook talks about
modifiy the boot floppies to use the console, this isn't so easy 
with a d/led ISO image)

After much mucking around I finally worked out how to perform a
binary upgrade without resorting to either a floppy or cd to boot.
My instructions follow in case they are of use to anyone else.

rgds/mark


Instructions for Upgrade Install without floppy / cdrom
-------------------------------------------------------

The prerequisite is a working system (or at least boot blocks
and existing ffs partitions).  The first step is to unpack 
the normal installation images and copy the contents onto 
a subdirectory of your root partition.

# cd /
# mkdir installroot
# cd installroot
# vnconfig vn0c /cdrom/floppies/boot.flp
# mount /dev/vn0c /mnt
# cp -r /mnt/* /installroot

Aftere this procedure there is an /installroot directory on
your root partition with all the files needed to bootstrap
the installation.

Now reboot the computer and press space to enter the loader.
Once you get the bootloader prompt then enter the following.

ok load /installroot/kernel
ok load -t mfs_root /installroot/mfsroot
ok set vfs.root.mountfrom="ufs:/dev/md0c"
ok boot

Now the new kernel and mfs image should boot and the install start
as per normal.

To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org
with "unsubscribe freebsd-hackers" in the body of the message




Want to link to this message? Use this URL: <https://mail-archive.FreeBSD.org/cgi/mid.cgi?3D549CA6.29734446>