[CentOS] Install CentOS over FTP

Phil Schaffner Philip.R.Schaffner at NASA.gov
Fri Aug 17 18:39:18 UTC 2007


On Fri, 2007-08-17 at 17:18 +0100, Mário Gamito wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> Sorry for the newbie question, I've been searching the CentOS site and 
> googled, but I couldn't find an answer (probably my bad).
> 
> I want to install CentOS 4.5, but I'm having troubles with my CD reader.
> 
> How can I install it from an FTP server ?
> 
> Any help would be appreciated.
> 
> Warm Regards

You need to be able to boot to the installer somehow.  If you have a
working Linux with GRUB the following should work.

Download initrd.img and vmlinuz from your favorite mirror, e.g.

http://mirror.linux.duke.edu/pub/centos/4.5/os/i386/isolinux/

Put them in /boot and rename to initrd-c4.img and vmlinuz-c4
respectively.  Add the following stanza to /boot/grub/grub.conf (or
possibly menu.lst depending on distro).

title CentOS 4 Installer
        root (hd0,0)
        kernel /vmlinuz-c4 ro ramdisk=8192
        initrd /initrd-c4.img

This assumes a boot partition /dev/hda1 (or sda1).  Adjust according to
your setup.  If no boot partition the paths above must be prefixed by
"/boot".

Boot to the installer and provide the address for the FTP (or HTTP)
server and the directory containing the os/<arch> tree.

Another approach would be to use bootable USB media for the installer
image:

http://mirror.linux.duke.edu/pub/centos/4.5/os/i386/images/diskboot.img

Could also set up a PXE server.

Phil





More information about the CentOS mailing list