SuperBlade SBI-6119R-C3N/T3N User's Manual
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Figure 2-3. Installing a Hard Drive in a Carrier
2.7 Installing the Operating System
An operating system (OS) must be installed on each blade module. Blades with Microsoft
Windows OS and blades with Linux OS can both occupy and operate within the same blade
enclosure. Refer to the SuperMicro website for a complete list of supported operating systems.
There are several methods of installing an OS to the blade modules.
Installing with an External USB CD-ROM Drive
The most common method of installing the OS is with an external USB CD-ROM drive. Take
the following steps to install the OS to a blade module:
Caution:
Installing the OS from an external CD-ROM drive may take several hours to complete.
Installing via PXE Boot
PXE (Preboot Execution Environment) is used to boot a computer over a network. To install
the OS via PXE, the following conditions must be met:
1. The PXE Boot option in BIOS must be enabled.
2.
A PXE server has been configured (this can be another blade in the system).
3. The PXE server must be connected over a network to the blade to be booted.
4. The blade has only non-partitioned/unformatted hard drives installed and no bootable
devices attached to it.
Once these conditions are met, make sure the PXE server is running. Then turn on the blade
on which you wish to boot and/or install the OS. The BIOS in the blade will look at all bootable
devices and finding none will connect to the PXE server to begin the boot/install.
