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I'm a bit suspicious since I cannot find relevant recent information on this.

I am wanting to boot a diskless XenServer version 6.2 (the server... not the installer). I have an Intel Pro 1000 ET NIC that supports iSCSI. I am able to intall XenServe 6.2 from CDROM onto an iSCSI device using this info:

https://www.krystalmods.com/index.php?title=xenserver-6-supports-iscsi-boot-undocumented-feature&more=1&c=1&tb=1&pb=1

On reboot the system will start to boot and then eventually hang. It appears the iSCSI interface gets renamed which causes it to drop out (that is my understanding).

My suspicion comes from the number of people wanting to do this but there being no (easily findable) updates on the item since 2012. My posts to the alternate forums have never been approved.

XenServer 6.2 is supposed to be open source. Does anybody have updated information on how to boot XenServer Diskless using an Intel iSCSI enabled ethernet interface?

Andrew B
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Steve
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  • It should be possible. I'm playing with netbooting other things at the moment and the dhcp or reconfig on the primary interface is definitely an issue you'd have to sort out. You'd need to modify your initrd. Modifying xenserver is not so straight forward as I've found out before trying to get custom kernel modules into it. It's all very old under the hood. – hookenz May 19 '14 at 20:39
  • Did you ever figured it out? – Vinícius Ferrão Feb 14 '15 at 15:12
  • @ViníciusFerrão Looks like not, so I've placed a bounty. Do feel free to try and answer. – Criggie Dec 21 '15 at 03:22
  • @Criggie - please provide the last boot messages before your system hangs. – sam_pan_mariusz Dec 21 '15 at 15:04
  • @sam_pan_mariusz Better to ask Steve the OP. – Criggie Dec 21 '15 at 18:49
  • `XenServer is open source`: Many inscrutable things are open source. – Joel E Salas Dec 23 '15 at 20:10
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    I would follow this setup: http://debaan.blogspot.fr/2014/10/xenserver-boot-from-iscsi.html also according this bolg post: "UPDATE: XenServer boot from iSCSI (at least with iBFT) is just plain awful. Don't bother. Multipath does not work. Too many hacks to try to get things to work. It is not supported, anyway, and it will probably break every time you do an upgrade. Plus, the NICs that you use for iSCSI boot will be unusable for any other purpose. This is aspect of XenServer is very immature and not robust." – Avlin Dec 24 '15 at 04:33
  • @avlin Post that as an answer and I'll award the bounty. – Criggie Dec 28 '15 at 03:14

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I would follow this setup: debaan.blogspot.fr/2014/10/xenserver-boot-from-iscsi.html

also according this blog post:

UPDATE: XenServer boot from iSCSI (at least with iBFT) is just plain awful. Don't bother. Multipath does not work. Too many hacks to try to get things to work. It is not supported, anyway, and it will probably break every time you do an upgrade. Plus, the NICs that you use for iSCSI boot will be unusable for any other purpose. This is aspect of XenServer is very immature and not robust.

Avlin
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