amtterm catching boot options vs installing gentoo

[vespaman]

Hi all,

I admit this is a bit lazy, but I would like to install gentoo on a computer mounted in a rack, which is headless.
I *could* of course get there, unscrew it and bring it to some place where I have a monitor and keyboard.

Here's current status;
* I have plugged a live USB into one of the USB ports, but it does not boot from it.
* I have root login to the box over ssh. It is some kind of debian install ~4yo by the looks of it.
* I have AMT access to the box, sort of: I can put my browser to it, and it shows me the Intel AMT stuff, I can reboot etc.
* I exposes 3 sata disks + the USB stick.
* If I use amtterm while I reset the machine from the AMT webui, I this is what I get;

Code: Select all

$ amtterm 10.1.200.254 -p password-1A
amtterm: NONE -> CONNECT (connection to host)
ipv4 10.1.200.254 [10.1.200.254] 16994 open
amtterm: CONNECT -> INIT (redirection initialization)
amtterm: INIT -> AUTH (session authentication)
amtterm: AUTH -> INIT_SOL (serial-over-lan initialization)
amtterm: INIT_SOL -> RUN_SOL (serial-over-lan active)
serial-over-lan redirection ok
connected now, use ^] to escape
The system is powered off.
The system is powered on. 

But there's no way for me to change boot device, or enter BIOS. I suppose that once it hits grub, and grub is not configured for AMT in mind, there will be no output.

I might be wrong, but I think that I have been able to enter bios somehow before on this box, but I don't remember how. Maybe I dreamt it. Or is tere something that I need to do, once it shows 'powered on', to access bios or change boot disk?


Anyone have any suggestion on how gain boot access using AMT, or to best put gentoo onto it?


- The lazy guy

[pingtoo]

May be you can share more about your remote machine setup. For example partition lay out and if there is any boot loader used.

In general, if your machine can boot you don't need USB for install Gentoo. you don't have to make any changes to boot device changes if your boot device have enough space for kernel/initrd.

I suggest you start with stage3 install in a chroot setup. follow by configure a new boot entry with your current kernel but with different boot command line option with the new "root=..." to use the newly created stage3 install.

Once you know you can successfully boot with Gentoo rootfs, then consider build/install Gentoo kernel.

I think with this procedure you don't need connect monitor/keyboard to your remote computer.

[vespaman]

Sure!
The boot disk seems to have this setup:

Code: Select all

Disk: /dev/sda
                   Size: 111.8 GiB, 120034123776 bytes, 234441648 sectors
                             Label: dos, identifier: 0x1725a2f3

    Device        Boot         Start        End    Sectors    Size  Id Type
    /dev/sda1     *             2048  217843711  217841664  103.9G  83 Linux
    /dev/sda2              217845758  234440703   16594946    7.9G   5 Extended
     -> /dev/sda5            217845760  234440703   16594944    7.9G  82 Linux swap / Solaris 

This looks to be some kind of old SSD, and it looks to have 96GB free, so the current installation must be very skinny.

Then there's a larger 256-ish SSD as well, not mounted/used.
Then there's a spinning 4TB-ish disk, also not mounted/used.

But I can't chroot into the current / device, since it already has this debian install here, can I? Or do you mean to use one of the other disks as a new root?

[pingtoo]

Sure!
The boot disk seems to have this setup:

Code: Select all

Disk: /dev/sda
                   Size: 111.8 GiB, 120034123776 bytes, 234441648 sectors
                             Label: dos, identifier: 0x1725a2f3

    Device        Boot         Start        End    Sectors    Size  Id Type
    /dev/sda1     *             2048  217843711  217841664  103.9G  83 Linux
    /dev/sda2              217845758  234440703   16594946    7.9G   5 Extended
     -> /dev/sda5            217845760  234440703   16594944    7.9G  82 Linux swap / Solaris 

This looks to be some kind of old SSD, and it looks to have 96GB free, so the current installation must be very skinny.

Then there's a larger 256-ish SSD as well, not mounted/used.
Then there's a spinning 4TB-ish disk, also not mounted/used.

But I can't chroot into the current / device, since it already has this debian install here, can I? Or do you mean to use one of the other disks as a new root?

Was your original intention is to just replace the existing OSE on the disk by some method of install Gentoo?

Please review Gentoo AMD64 Handbook, there are better explain on how to setup chroot.

[vespaman]

Yes, my original intention was to install gentoo over this existing os. I thought this would not be too complicated, since I have the AMT, but, yeah...

So I suspect your suggestion is to install into another drive, then once that is up, reinstall on the current root disk?
I suppose this is doable, but I'd still then would like to get AMT going, at least for grub, since it only takes one mistake to brick the machine if there's no access to grub.

[pingtoo]

Yes, my original intention was to install gentoo over this existing os. I thought this would not be too complicated, since I have the AMT, but, yeah...

So I suspect your suggestion is to install into another drive, then once that is up, reinstall on the current root disk?
I suppose this is doable, but I'd still then would like to get AMT going, at least for grub, since it only takes one mistake to brick the machine if there's no access to grub.

Yes, my suggestion is about using an alternative location (may be a new disk).

From you initial post it seems to me the AMT is setup to output serial over lan. so you will need to configure GRUB to use serial console. I don't use GRUB myself so I cannot give you definitive answer however google search show https://www.gnu.org/software/grub/manua ... minal.html may be able to give you better answer for setup grub.

[vespaman]

Yes, this is SOL. I think that the last time (years ago), when I had this in use, I proabably had grub<2 and definately systemV, this debian installation has grub2 and systemd. I suspect this is why it does not work.
Maybe I'll give up on AMT and take my chances. If things go bad, I'll have to consider getting the machine out.

Cheers,
- the lazy one

[pingtoo]

On your current installation (assume the debian) you should have /boot/grub.conf file. You can examine to see if it have serial port setup as instructed in the GRUB url.

The key I am suggestion is at this point you don't need to concern modify BIOS yet (because the AMT may not allow you do that) but modify inside linux should change the boot behaviors, if you can create a new grub entry using the existing boot entry and modified with serial setup and may be change the boot default timing to a bit longer so you have chance to interrupt grub to allow you select kernel then you are good to go.