Booting from TFTP
&boot-installer-intro-net.xml;
Booting from CD-ROM
&boot-installer-intro-cd.xml;
Booting from Firmware
&boot-installer-intro-firmware.xml;
Booting the NSLU2
There are three ways how to put the installer firmware into flash:
Using the NSLU2 web interface
Go to the administration section and choose the menu item
Upgrade. You can then browse your disk for the
installer image you have previously downloaded. Then press the
Start Upgrade button, confirm, wait for a few minutes
and confirm again. The system will then boot straight into the installer.
Via the network using Linux/Unix
You can use upslug2 from any Linux or Unix machine to
upgrade the machine via the network. This software is packaged for
Debian.
First, you have to put your NSLU2 in upgrade mode:
Disconnect any disks and/or devices from the USB ports.
Power off the NSLU2
Press and hold the reset button (accessible through the small hole on the
back just above the power input).
Press and release the power button to power on the NSLU2.
Wait for 10 seconds watching the ready/status LED. After 10 seconds it
will change from amber to red. Immediately release the reset button.
The NSLU2 ready/status LED will flash alternately red/green (there is a 1
second delay before the first green). The NSLU2 is now in upgrade mode.
See the NSLU2-Linux
pages if you have problems with this.
Once your NSLU2 is in upgrade mode, you can flash the new image:
sudo upslug2 -i di-nslu2.bin
Note that the tool also shows the MAC address of your NSLU2, which may come
in handy to configure your DHCP server. After the whole image has been
written and verified, the system will automatically reboot. Make sure you
connect your USB disk again now, otherwise the installer won't be able to
find it.
Via the network using Windows
There is a
tool for Windows to upgrade the firmware via the network.
Booting the SS4000-E
Due to limitations in the SS4000-E firmware, it unfortunately is not
possible to boot the installer without the use of a serial port at
this time. To boot the installer, you will need a serial nullmodem
cable; a computer with a serial port
A USB serial converter will also work.
; and a ribbon cable with a male DB9 connector at one end,
and a 10-pin .1" IDC header at the other
This cable is often found in older desktop machines with builtin 9-pin
serial ports.
.
To boot the SS4000-E, use your serial nullmodem cable and the ribbon
cable to connect to the serial port of the SS4000-E, and reboot the
machine. You need to use a serial terminal application to communicate
with the machine; a good option on a Debian GNU/Linux is to use the
cu program, in the package of the same name. Assuming
the serial port on your computer is to be found on
/dev/ttyS0, use the following command line:
cu -lttyS0 -s115200
If using Windows, you may want to consider using the program
hyperterminal. Use a baud rate of 115200,
8 bits word length, no stop bits, and one parity bit.
When the machine boots, you will see the following line of output:
No network interfaces found
EM-7210 ver.T04 2005-12-12 (For ver.AA)
== Executing boot script in 1.000 seconds - enter ^C to abort
At this point, hit Control-C to interrupt the boot
loader
Note that you have only one second to do so; if you miss this window,
just powercycle the machine and try again.
. This will give you the RedBoot prompt. Enter the
following commands:
load -v -r -b 0x01800000 -m ymodem ramdisk.gz
load -v -r -b 0x01008000 -m ymodem zImage
exec -c "console=ttyS0,115200 rw root=/dev/ram mem=256M@0xa0000000" -r 0x01800000
After every load command, the system will expect a
file to be transmitted using the YMODEM protocol. When using cu, make
sure you have the package lrzsz installed, then
hit enter, followed by the ~<
escape sequence to start
an external program, and run sb initrd.gz or
sb vmlinuz.
Alternatively, it is possible to load the kernel and ramdisk using
HTTP rather than YMODEM. This is faster, but requires a working HTTP
server on the network. To do so, first switch the bootloader to RAM mode:
fis load rammode
g
This will seemingly restart the machine; but in reality, it loads
reboot to RAM and restarts it from there. Not doing this step will cause
the system to hang in the necessary ip_address step that comes next.
You will need to hit Ctrl-C again to interrupt the boot. Then:
ip_address -l 192.168.2.249 -h 192.168.2.4
load -v -r -b 0x01800000 -m http /initrd.gz
load -v -r -b 0x01008000 -m http /zImage
exec -c "console=ttyS0,115200 rw root=/dev/ram mem=256M@0xa0000000" -r 0x01800000
The installer will now start as usual.