Installing _from_ and USB drive?

[Viper780]

Hi there

I want to install FreeNAS 9.2.1 on an SSD in my new NAS and I don't have any Optical Drive (except my Wii and the DVD Changer - but both won't help ;) ) in my home anymore.
Is there a way to get the Iso file on an Thumbdrive and install it from there? I don't want the USB stick after the installation in/on my NAS - therefore i have the SSD (which will also be a swap/cache for the System and ZFS Pools).

I know that most of the people just write the img file to an Thumbdrive and use that as system drive.

The only option i see is to start from an live linux and write the image with dd to the SSD and partion it afterwards with gparted (or something else). But when there is an installer why go the complicated way.

br
Daniel

 

[cyberjock]

The only 2 ways I can think of to install to an SSD is:

1. Install from a CD. Writing the ISO to the thumbdrive hasn't worked for people in the past.
2. Write the .img file to the SSD.(which I *think* is what you were trying to say in the last paragraph)

Your last paragraph talks about writing it with a linux live cd, but you won't be partition it afterwards. It's already partitioned in the image. You will write to the disk itself and not a partition as the image includes the partition table, file system, etc.

 

[Viper780]

Yes your 2nd point is what I ment in the last paragraph - the repartitining is only for the ZIl and L2ARC. I'll need that anyway.

But i can't use the SSD on my Notebook so i have to use anything else to boot up first to an OS that i can use dd for writing on the SSD.

I hope someone will make an ISO file that i can boot from an thumbdrive

 

[cyberjock]

Yeah.. nobody worries about that stuff because, as a rule we recommend server-grade parts. And that virtually guarantees you will have a system with IPMI. And that also means that remotely mounting ISOs and booting from them is possible. So why go to the extra work of creating something that a small percentage of people *might* use, but probably shouldn't because of their hardware.

Not to mention, CD-ROM drives are super cheap, and installing one for 10 minutes isn't that much of an inconvenience for most people.

And not to mention the fact that you can always install FreeNAS from a different machine than the one you intend to use, the move the boot media accordingly.

There's just so many options it would be a waste to spend our already very limited developer resources on something that only a handful of people will use in a year.

 

[Viper780]

Its actually an Workstation System with IPMI. But i don't have configured it because i don't want to use it in a home environment - not worth the time here. I also don't want to use an optical disc - ever! This things have died for me since the USB thumbdrives. The ODDs are slow and noisy and have (for me) only disadvantages.

Also swapping drives (specially that one for the System) is a huge waste of time. Maybe i have here an workflow thats way off the usual habits. In my workplace is time essential so there are only 2 ways to install things. via Network when its for more than 2 machines and i can make an batch job and via thumbdrives because its fast and convinient. Also on the Server where i could use BMC and mounting Isos we use Thumbdrives.

But really how many of the FreeNAS user let it run on an real Server? In my production environment i have certified storage products (mostly netapp) and on my "playground" in the office i use NAS4Free. But I see that such thing isn't an option here so forget it.

My other question is what are the 4 different partitions in the image? With Linux i don't get any infos out of it and i'm not so fit with FreeBSD. Just want to change the Data partition in to a extended partition and resize it.

 

[cyberjock]

With IPMI you don't need an ODD. I installed FreeNAS to my USB stick with IPMI.

Most FreeNAS users use real server-grade hardware.

As for the partitions.. you should NOT even consider changing it. FreeNAS is designed as an appliance. Playing with the 4 partitions will make you very sad when you lose data...

 

[Viper780]

You can close this thread - i made an new one http://forums.freenas.org/index.php...ion-the-installation-drive.20002/#post-113127 hopefully i made my intentions a bit clearer there