Any way to net boot the FreeBSD installer?

Donald Burr of Borg dburr at borg-cube.com
Mon Jul 26 02:16:42 PDT 2004


I'm trying to install FreeBSD on a VIA Epia M6000 box - this is one of
those "Mini ITX" machines that has NO floppy drive controller, and the
machine doesn't have a CD-ROM drive either.  However, this machine DOES
have a BIOS that can net-boot using PXE.

Yes, I did try booting from a USB floppy drive.  The first install disk
booted, however when it asked for the MFSroot disk, it was unable to read
it.  Probably because the boot floppy was expecting to read data from a
(nonexistent) floppy drive/controller, rather than the USB floppy drive
(which it probably doesn't know anything about).

Is there a way I can net-boot (using PXE) the FreeBSD installer?  I do
have another FreeBSD box here on my home network that I can set up as a
network boot server.  I just don't really know what to do, having never
done this sort of thing before.

Can anyone offer up some help, guidance, a "HOW TO" type guide, etc.?
Thanks!
-- 
Donald Burr of Borg <dburr at borg-cube.com> | FreeBSD: The Power to Serve!
Website: http://www.borg-cube.com/        | http://www.freebsd.org/
PO Box 91212, Santa Barbara CA 93190-1212 \-----------------------------
Tel: (805)563-0672  FAX: (760)875-9237  ICQ# 16997506  AIM:  dburrofborg


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