In the case of two of the three laptops I have here to play with, it's simply a matter of telling it to boot off the DVD drive and then inserting the appropriate disc and going on from there. In the case of this other one, things get a little weird.

On powerup I see messages referring to PXE, which if I remember correctly involves booting off a network connection? There's "Media test failure, check cable" followed by "Exiting PXE ROM" and then I get "No bootable device -- insert boot disk and
press any key.

The thing is, this machine doesn't have a DVD drive. What it does have is a couple of USB ports (two different color connectors so I assume different speeds?). I am also assuming that simply putting an iso file on to a USB stick won't quite do it. No
idea about how to implement anything to do with PXE, though I can probably safely assume that I have what I need on the LAN here.

Any thoughts on how best to deal with this?

--
Member of the toughest, meanest, deadliest, most unrelenting -- and
ablest -- form of life in this section of space,  a critter that can
be killed but can't be tamed.  --Robert A. Heinlein, "The Puppet Masters"
-
Information is more dangerous than cannon to a society ruled by lies. --James M Dakin

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On Tue, 27 Aug 2024 21:42:22 -0400
"Roy J. Tellason, Sr." <roy@rtellason.com> wrote:

The thing is, this machine doesn't have a DVD drive. What it does
have is a couple of USB ports (two different color connectors so I
assume different speeds?).

Correct. Usually blue is USB 3.x, black 2.x. I also have a yellow
connector on one of my machines. That is always powered on regardless
of whether the machine is powered up or not.

I am also assuming that simply putting an
iso file on to a USB stick won't quite do it.

It depends on how you put it on. Something like

dd if=debian-12.6.0-amd64-netinst.iso of=/dev/sdX

should do it. Note that you are copying to the raw device, not to any
partition or file system on a partition.

No idea about how to
implement anything to do with PXE, though I can probably safely
assume that I have what I need on the LAN here.

Never tried it myself. You are as capable of searching the net as I am.


--
Does anybody read signatures any more?

https://charlescurley.com
https://charlescurley.com/blog/

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Roy J. Tellason, Sr. wrote:

In the case of two of the three laptops I have here to play with, it's simply a matter of telling it to boot off the DVD drive and then inserting the appropriate disc and going on from there. In the case of this other one, things get a little weird.

On powerup I see messages referring to PXE, which if I remember correctly involves booting off a network connection? There's "Media test failure, check cable" followed by "Exiting PXE ROM" and then I get "No bootable device -- insert boot disk and

press any key.

The thing is, this machine doesn't have a DVD drive. What it does have is a couple of USB ports (two different color connectors so I assume different speeds?). I am also assuming that simply putting an iso file on to a USB stick won't quite do it.

No idea about how to implement anything to do with PXE, though I can probably safely assume that I have what I need on the LAN here.

Any thoughts on how best to deal with this?

If the machine can boot from USB, then, yes, writing the ISO to
a USB stick is all you need to do.

If not:

PXE booting requires three things:
- A dhcp server that answers the laptop's initial request for an
IP address with the additional options that point at a TFTP
server (isc-dhcp-server or kea, tftpd-hpa)
- a TFTP server serving a PXE boot menu that is configured to
point at a local web server
- the Debian install images on the local web server

If you are comfortable setting up each of those things -- there
are extensive guides -- PXE booting-and-install is almost magical. If you
need to do it often, I highly recommend it.

But try the USB stick first.

-dsr-

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Hi,

On Tue, Aug 27, 2024 at 09:42:22PM -0400, Roy J. Tellason, Sr. wrote:

On powerup I see messages referring to PXE, which if I remember
correctly involves booting off a network connection?

Yes. You can almost certainly disable this feature in the BIOS
settings if it bothers you. Typically you only see it when the BIOS
(or UEFI firmware) sees no other bootable media.

The thing is, this machine doesn't have a DVD drive. What it
does have is a couple of USB ports (two different color connectors
so I assume different speeds?).

Sometimes conventions aren't followed, but here is a hint:

https://www.usbmemorydirect.com/blog/usb-port-colors/

I am also assuming that simply
putting an iso file on to a USB stick won't quite do it.

That is the correct way to deal with Debian's ISO images. Whether
your BIOS supports booting from that is a bit hit and miss. It's
worth a try as it works a lot of the time.

Also look in the BIOS settings for boot order priority. If that
mentions USB as an option then it's very likely to work.

No idea
about how to implement anything to do with PXE, though I can
probably safely assume that I have what I need on the LAN here.

Yes; if the machine tried to do PXE then you don't need anything
fancy elsewhere other than another networked machine that can serve
DHCP and TFTP, which Linux does just fine. It's a bit of an involved
process though so unless setting up PXE booting is desirable you may
want to find another way.

Any thoughts on how best to deal with this?

I'd try the USB media approach as it'll probably work. If the laptop
was never designed to have an internal optical media drive then it
was probably also designed to boot off of USB for installation
purposes.

If that doesn't work, would it be possible to take the HDD/SSD out
of the laptop and put it in another machine? You could then install
onto that and put it back in the laptop afterwards.

Thanks,
Andy

--
https://bitfolk.com/ -- No-nonsense VPS hosting

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On 8/27/24 21:42, Roy J. Tellason, Sr. wrote:

The thing is, this machine doesn't have a DVD drive. What it does have
is a couple of USB ports (two different color connectors so I assume different speeds?). I am also assuming that simply putting an iso file
on to a USB stick won't quite do it.

You may need to tell the BIOS-equivalent to boot off a USB device. Maybe that's already in the "try things in this order" list before "internal HD",
so it's worth a try.

--
Driscoll's Observation: The product of the IQs of each member
of a tech-support conversation is a constant.

-- Michael Driscoll on ASR

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On Tue 27 Aug 2024 at 21:42:22 (-0400), Roy J. Tellason, Sr. wrote:

In the case of two of the three laptops I have here to play with, it's simply a matter of telling it to boot off the DVD drive and then inserting the appropriate disc and going on from there. In the case of this other one, things get a little weird.

On powerup I see messages referring to PXE, which if I remember correctly involves booting off a network connection? There's "Media test failure, check cable" followed by "Exiting PXE ROM" and then I get "No bootable device -- insert boot disk and

press any key.

The thing is, this machine doesn't have a DVD drive. What it does have is a couple of USB ports (two different color connectors so I assume different speeds?). I am also assuming that simply putting an iso file on to a USB stick won't quite do it.

No idea about how to implement anything to do with PXE, though I can probably safely assume that I have what I need on the LAN here.

Any thoughts on how best to deal with this?

I assume your DVD drives are internal, so they're always present when
you boot up, and they're always selectable in the BIOS menus.

I have a laptop that only shows a USB stick as available in the menu
/if/ it's already plugged in before you turn on the power. If you
don't plug it in that early, you might be unaware that it could boot
from a USB stick at all: there's no mention of that in the specs, and
no hint in the extensive PhoenixBIOS documentation that you have to
expand the /Hard Drive/ item in the Boot menu to reveal the USB stick
under the actual hard drive. (You then have to promote the USB above
the hard drive in the two-item list.)

Cheers,
David.

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On Tuesday 27 August 2024 10:01:07 pm Andy Smith wrote:

That is the correct way to deal with Debian's ISO images. Whether
your BIOS supports booting from that is a bit hit and miss. It's
worth a try as it works a lot of the time.

Also look in the BIOS settings for boot order priority. If that
mentions USB as an option then it's very likely to work.

Found that, finally, and it's odd. There's a selection for "Legacy" which can be switched to UEFI, and under the boot order stuff they mention USB floppy (!) and USB CDROM. I've fiddled with it.

(...)

I'd try the USB media approach as it'll probably work. If the laptop
was never designed to have an internal optical media drive then it
was probably also designed to boot off of USB for installation
purposes.

It has no place for an optical drive.

If that doesn't work, would it be possible to take the HDD/SSD out
of the laptop and put it in another machine? You could then install
onto that and put it back in the laptop afterwards.

I don't think that I'd end up with the proper drivers if I did that...

Digging a bit further and looking at the specs for this thing, it's a not-very-fast celeron dual core processor, only 2G of RAM, and 32G of SSD in there. I'm a bit less inclined to bother with it than I was. Maybe I'll try the memory stick and see
how it goes...

--
Member of the toughest, meanest, deadliest, most unrelenting -- and
ablest -- form of life in this section of space,  a critter that can
be killed but can't be tamed.  --Robert A. Heinlein, "The Puppet Masters"
-
Information is more dangerous than cannon to a society ruled by lies. --James M Dakin

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
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Op 28-08-2024 om 03:30 schreef Roy J. Tellason, Sr.:

In the case of two of the three laptops I have here to play with, it's simply a matter of telling it to boot off the DVD drive and then inserting the appropriate disc and going on from there. In the case of this other one, things get a little weird.

On powerup I see messages referring to PXE, which if I remember correctly involves booting off a network connection? There's "Media test failure, check cable" followed by "Exiting PXE ROM" and then I get "No bootable device -- insert boot disk and

press any key.

The thing is, this machine doesn't have a DVD drive.

You could use an removable USB DVD drive, but I would prefer an USB stick.

What it does have is a couple of USB ports (two different color
connectors so I assume different speeds?). I am also assuming that
simply putting an iso file on to a USB stick won't quite do it.

You have to put it the right way on the stick, not as a regular file,
but as an image:
https://d-i.debian.org/manual/en.amd64/ch04s03.html

You can also use "dd".
dd if=debian.....iso of=/dev/sdX bs=4M status=progress; sync

With regards,
Paul


--
Paul van der Vlis Linux systeembeheer Groningen
https://vandervlis.nl

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"Roy J. Tellason, Sr." <roy@rtellason.com> writes:

I don't think that I'd end up with the proper drivers if I did that...

Linux distributions usually ship with almost all drivers, some specific
ones might need an extra step to install. But I've never had a driver
issue with Debian when changing hardware of an installed system, like
switching a motherboard in a desktop.

I think this kind of claim needs serious qualification but I've noticed
Andrew Cater also making it earlier.

Digging a bit further and looking at the specs for this thing, it's a not-very-fast celeron dual core processor, only 2G of RAM, and 32G of
SSD in there. I'm a bit less inclined to bother with it than I was.
Maybe I'll try the memory stick and see how it goes...

These can be funny. I've previously tried to boot my 2021 Samsung Galaxy
Book from a stick and got nowhere. Or got to the boot menu all right but
it only showed the internal SSD.

Recently after a little googling, some obscure web site claimed the
memory stick should be at least 32 GB and formatted exfat or ntfs. The
latter requirement probably isn't true but I tried a 128 GB stick and it
booted no problem. Amazing. This on a laptop with extremely limited
options in what goes for bios these days.

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On Fri, 30 Aug 2024 10:13:32 +0300
Anssi Saari <anssi.saari@debian-user.mail.kapsi.fi> wrote:

"Roy J. Tellason, Sr." <roy@rtellason.com> writes:

I don't think that I'd end up with the proper drivers if I did
that...

Linux distributions usually ship with almost all drivers, some
specific ones might need an extra step to install. But I've never had
a driver issue with Debian when changing hardware of an installed
system, like switching a motherboard in a desktop.

I think this kind of claim needs serious qualification but I've
noticed Andrew Cater also making it earlier.

I've always seen this as an installation option: you are asked if you
want 'all drivers' or only those specific to the installation machine.
If I was installing to a drive intended to go into a different computer
I'd select 'all drivers', but not otherwise.

--
Joe

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