pyrox.dev
1# Booting from the "netboot" media (PXE) {#sec-booting-from-pxe}
2
3Advanced users may wish to install NixOS using an existing PXE or iPXE
4setup.
5
6These instructions assume that you have an existing PXE or iPXE
7infrastructure and want to add the NixOS installer as another
8option. To build the necessary files from your current version of nixpkgs,
9you can run:
10
11```ShellSession
12nix-build -A netboot.x86_64-linux '<nixpkgs/nixos/release.nix>'
13```
14
15This will create a `result` directory containing:
16
17* `bzImage` -- the Linux kernel
18* `initrd` -- the initrd file
19* `netboot.ipxe` -- an example ipxe script demonstrating the appropriate kernel command line arguments for this image
20
21If you're using plain PXE, configure your boot loader to use the
22`bzImage` and `initrd` files and have it provide the same kernel command
23line arguments found in `netboot.ipxe`.
24
25If you're using iPXE, depending on how your HTTP/FTP/etc. server is
26configured you may be able to use `netboot.ipxe` unmodified, or you may
27need to update the paths to the files to match your server's directory
28layout.
29
30In the future we may begin making these files available as build
31products from hydra at which point we will update this documentation
32with instructions on how to obtain them either for placing on a
33dedicated TFTP server or to boot them directly over the internet.