Restoring Image from PXE

general discussion
1

Hi,

i managed to boot urbackup.iso from PXE to restore many stations without burning CDROM …
If your network card is managed by UrBakup-Live-Restore, then from a tftp server you can :

0- Set a tftp server with dhcp working
1- unzip the UrBakup-Live-Restore ISO in a directory called urbackup ( http://sourceforge.net/projects/urbackup/files/Restore/1.0%20WIP/urbackup_restore_en_1.0WIP3.iso/download )
2- edit your pxelinux.cfg/default file as below (replace the ip address of the server) :

LABEL UrBackup Restore
kernel urbackup/live/vmlinuz
append initrd=urbackup/live/initrd.img boot=live config username=urbackup fetch=tftp://xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx/urbackup/live/filesystem.squashfs

Then the magic happens …

Martin, your work is great !!

1 Like
2

Thanks! Put it into the wiki: https://urbackup.atlassian.net/wiki/display/US/Restoring+Images+from+PXE

3

Hi,

You can also use the latter debian 7 network install ISO vmlinuz and initrd. The benefit is this enables you to use hostnames and supporting later hardware. I also use the toram option and load over http which is faster than tftp - probably not a big issue for such a small image but it helps.

Thanks,
Al

LABEL URbackup
Menu Label ^UrBackup
kernel vmlinuz
append initrd=initrd.img boot=live config username=urbackup toram noswap fetch=http://tftp/urbackup/filesystem.squashfs

4

I’ve updated the wiki with this information. Can you check if everything is correct? ( https://urbackup.atlassian.net/wiki/display/US/Restoring+Images+from+PXE )

6

I have managed to get it working on NOC-PS if anyone is interested

Cache folder on disk: urbackup
ISO file: http://hndl.urbackup.org/Restore/urbackup_restore_2.0.2.iso

PXE Script

#!gpxe
kernel http://$server/proxy.php/live/vmlinuz2 boot=live username=urbackup union=aufs noswap noprompt vga=788 fetch=http://$server/proxy.php/live/filesystem.squashfs live-config ocs_live_keymap=NONE ocs_lang=en_US.UTF-8
initrd http://$server/proxy.php/live/initrd2.img
boot

7

The methods listed above unfortunately do not work (for me).

There is my way with iPXE loader and fast HTTP server. This solution also work with UEFI system too. It work fine with current Urbackup restore disk 2.1.1.
Unpack current *.iso restore CD and copy content to your HTTP server in /.

#!ipxe

kernel http://${server_ip}/live/vmlinuz initrd=initramfs boot=live username=urbackup noswap noprompt vga=788 fetch=http://${server_ip}/live/filesystem.squashfs live-config ocs_live keymap=NONE ocs_lang=en_US.UTF-8
initrd --name initramfs http://${server_ip}/live/initrd.img
boot

I spent a lot of time before I could find a solution for downloading workstation on UEFI - if I could help you - can thank me in BTC
3M1Q6zMsQV4P2ESeG57o2T9ZXf6pVtRzuz

1 Like
8

For those who use Netboot.xyz, I have added a short Gist detailing how to get the Urbackup restore ISO netbooting at the following URL: Netbooting the Urbackup restore ISO with Netboot.xyz · GitHub

1 Like
9

I’d like to mention for everyone who is looking for a quick and easy way to PXE boot and restore.
I have just finished testing an image restore and it worked perfectly using iVentoy.
I made an image of a base install of windows 11, running under Proxmox. It had some of my usual software, such as acrobat, 7-zip, and steam to ensure software functionality.
Using another VM of Debian with Urbackup, I made a full image to a BTRFS formatted disk. Backed up 50GB, compressed to 37GB as RAW automatically.
I generated a fresh VM with similar specs to original.
Placed Urbackup Restore disk in iVentoy’s ISO folder, and booted new VM to it via PXE
Chose image, and restore works absolutely perfectly.
Cannot recommend this setup enough. 10/10 amazing software.

12

We have spent about 4 weeks trying to get this to work with iPXE under UEFI (we have a whole system working for Windows DVD images using wimboot system, and that works very well).

It appears BZIMAGE for Linux images are not compatible with UEFI mode booting, although the CD boots in UEFI mode (directly, we found it restores way better when using UEFI) we cant get this working via PXE when it boots in UEFI, so was this CD image compiled using EFI stub support enabled?

When trying to boot this using UEFI PXE it has no way to file the file system, we have tried all ways to reference initrd for the kernel and nothing works. It would be so nice to get a restore image thats bootable in PXE UEFI modem working.

13

Did you try my instructions from my Gist? I just checked them now and this still seems to work when I boot UEFI mode:

Netbooting the Urbackup restore ISO with Netboot.xyz · GitHub

14

We tried this for many weeks and it wasnt working, ive had a life changing event since then so this has been pushed down the list to look at currently