Installing servers using your own PXE boot environment.
Introduction
Leaseweb offers customers to install a dedicated server using their own PXE boot environment. This way an installation can be performed with specific Operating System versions that Leaseweb currently does not offer or OS versions that are customized.
Technical
Leaseweb uses a DHCP/iPXE boot environment to install dedicated servers. We provide the option for customers to list, create and delete their own DHCP leases. With creating the leases it is possible to send your own boot file name using the API or Customer Portal, as well as boot server details (DHCP options 66 and 67) and DNS server IP address.
This way it is possible to hook your Leaseweb dedicated server to any automated installation platform (like TheForeman, FAI, Cobbler and others). Leaseweb provides the network details, although optionally you can set your own nameserver(s) to use during installation. In all cases, the primary public IPv4 address of your server is automatically used.
How to
Information
To fully understand the functionality of iPXE boot and explore the functionality, http://ipxe.org/ has extensive examples and documentation for creating boot environments.
To make use of this feature you will need to have your own HTTP infrastructure and provide the URI to the iPXE instructions. The version of iPXE LeaseWeb uses supports HTTP.
To tell us the location of your iPXE instructions, you can use an API call to specify the boot file to http://1.1.1.1/boot.ipxe
For more details on how to use the Leaseweb API, check developer.leaseweb.com – Create a DHCP lease
POST /bareMetals/v2/servers/12345/leases
HOST: api.leaseweb.com
Headers:
'X-Lsw-Auth: 213423-2134234-234234-23424'
'content-type: application/json'
Body:
{
"bootfile": "http://example.com/bootme.ipxe"
}Or you can click Custom Installation under Actions on your server’s management page in the Customer Portal:
When you reboot your server, the DHCP server will instruct your bare metal server to boot using that boot file name.
Example ipxe configurations:
| Linux: http://1.1.1.1/boot.ipxe |
|
| Windows: http://1.1.1.1/boot.ipxe |
|
For more information on how to boot into a Windows installer refer to the ipxe.org documentation at http://ipxe.org/howto/winpe
Information
New deliveries of the following server models will boot in UEFI mode by default:
- Dell PowerEdge 14th and later generations (R240, R640, R740, R940)
- HPE ProLiant Gen10 and later generations
- Supermicro X11 and later generations
In case you develop your own bootable images, please make sure they’re UEFI compatible.
Presets
Besides using your own boot file, a few presets are available
Netboot.xyz
A custom install using http://boot.netboot.xyz/menu.ipxe allows you to pxe boot into any operating system supported by the https://netboot.xyz project.
This is ideal in case you would like to do a manual installation using Leaseweb Remote Management, without having to mount a large ISO file via the server’s Remote Management interface.
To learn what Operating Systems and other live images are supported, check out the FAQ https://netboot.xyz/faq/.
