XigmaNAS

See this thread on all the ways in which it doesn't work, the way that does is:

1. Set up a LiveUSB stick to boot from and plug it into the target device.
2. Fire up the device, wait for it to boot, and navigate to http://192.168.1.250.
3. Via the WebGUI, enable SSH and root logon via SSH.
4. SSH in as user root, password nas4free.
5. Using dmesg or 'camcontrol devlist', locate the device you want to install to, e.g. ada0 for a built-in HDD/SSD.
6. Run /etc/rc.initial.install. This takes you through the normal install process, documented elsewhere.
7. shutdown -h now
8. Remove the USB stick and reboot, you should now be booting off the built-in storage device, e.g. ada0.

Repeating my comment in the other thread, it would be good to have the serial console enabled by default just for the LiveUSB boot (even if it's disabled by default after the install) which would make the headless install process a lot less painful, since it'd (presumably) now follow the same workflow as the standard install.

hastdotwhat wrote:Repeating my comment in the other thread, it would be good to have the serial console enabled by default just for the LiveUSB boot (even if it's disabled by default after the install) which would make the headless install process a lot less painful, since it'd (presumably) now follow the same workflow as the standard install.

This is impossible. If you don't have com ports (include disable port), boot process is stopped for waiting the port output is ready.
So default disable is reasonable value for more system.

daoyama wrote:This is impossible. If you don't have com ports (include disable port), boot process is stopped for waiting the port output is ready.
So default disable is reasonable value for more system.

Ah, OK. Thanks for the info.

Better use motherboards with IPMI feature, those are very easy for maintenance and on top of it very easy headless installs when needed.

Posting to an old thread, but this does still seem to be tricky for installing N4F on non-IPMI systems. FreeNAS solves this by adding a grub menu line to the live CD/USB for "FreeNAS Installer (Serial Enabled)".

An updated writeup for XigmaNAS since the headless install process has changed a bit, and in particular the output to the serial console is quite different...

If watching via serial console, it'll sit at "Booting from Hard Disk..." for quite a long time, the only way to see that anything is going on is to watch the USB key's LED flickering. Eventually this will stop and after awhile the system will beep twice, at which point you can connect to the web interface at 192.168.1.250. Go to Services | SSH, click "Enable", click "Edit", check Permit root login, Allow password auth, Save and restart. At this point you can SSH in and run /etc/rc.initial.install as per the old instructions, in other words 'Install Embedded' and then keep hitting enter, ignoring the error messages that scroll past, finally exit and 'shutdown -h now'. You can now unplug/replug everything for operation rather than setup, the first restart will take a long time to come up as it carries out disk maintenance and whatnot, eventually it'll be pingable and after a further wait accessible via the web interface.