.\" $NetBSD: xfer,v 1.4 1999/05/07 00:15:17 ragge Exp $	
.
Installation is supported from several media types, including:
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.It
Tape
.It
NFS
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Floppy
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FTP
.El
.(Note
Installing on a "bare" machine requires some bootable
device; either a tape or floppy drive or a NFS server together
with a machine that can act as a MOP loader.
NetBSD/vax can use both BOOTP/DHCP and
BOOTPARAMS for netboot installations.
.Note)
.Pp
The procedure for transferring the distribution sets onto
installation media depends on the type of media. most of it is up to
you, depending what you want to install, but preferred are to do
the installation over network as soon as the miniroot is installed.
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.Ss2 Creating boot tapes
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Fetch the bootable miniroot image from
.Dl \&.../NetBSD-\*V/vax/miniroot/miniroot.gz Ns Ar {50,33}
Gunzip the miniroot and write it on the beginning of the tape.
Under Ultrix this is done like this:
.D1 Ic "gunzip miniroot.gz
.D1 Ic "mt -f /dev/rmt0h rewind
.D1 Ic "dd if=miniroot of=/dev/rmt0h
.D1 Ic "mt -f /dev/rmt0h rewoffl
.Pp
Under NetBSD this is done the same way, except for the tape name:
.D1 Ic "gunzip miniroot.gz
.D1 Ic "mt -f /dev/rmt8 rewind
.D1 Ic "dd if=miniroot of=/dev/rmt8
.D1 Ic "mt -f /dev/rmt8 rewoffl
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Of course, if you have a tape unit other than unit 0 you have to use
the corresponding unit number.
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If you are using any other OS to create bootable tapes, remember that
the blocksize
.Em must
be 512 for the file to be bootable! Otherwise it just won't work.
.
.Ss2 Creating boot floppies
.
Fetch the bootable miniroot image from
.Dl \&.../NetBSD-\*V/vax/miniroot/miniroot.gz Ns Ar {50,33}
and gunzip it. It is a 1.2MB bootable image that will boot from any
floppy of size 1.2MB and bigger.
Note that you
.Em cannot
install from RX50 floppies due to the small size. This may change
in the future.
.Pp
All floppies except RX50 uses a standardized format for storing data
so writing the miniroot to the floppy can be done on any PC. From DOS
the preferred way to do this is using RAWRITE.EXE.
.
.Ss2 Booting from NFS server
.
All VAXen that can boot over network uses MOP, a DEC protocol.
To be able to use MOP, a MOP daemon must be present on one of
the machines on the local network. The boot principle is:
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.It
The VAX broadcast a wish to load an image.
.It
A mopd answers and send the boot program to the VAX.
.It
The boot program does rarp/bootp requests, mounts the root filesystem
and loads the kernel.
.It
The kernel is loaded and starts executing.
.El
.Pp
If your machine has a disk and network connection, it may be
convenient for you to install NetBSD over the network. This
involves temporarily booting your machine over NFS, just long enough
so you can initialize its disk. This method requires that you have
access to an NFS server on your network so you can configure it to
support diskless boot for your machine. Configuring the NFS server
is normally a task for a system administrator, and is not trivial.
.Pp
If you are using a NetBSD system as the boot-server, have a look at
the
.Xr diskless 8
manual page for guidelines on how to proceed with
this. If the server runs another operating system, consult the
documentation that came with it. (I.e. add_client(8) on SunOS.)
.Pp
You also must install a MOP loader. If you are booting from another
NetBSD machine, MOP are included in the distribution, otherwise you
may have to install a MOP loader. A loader can be found at
.Lk ftp.stacken.kth.se:/pub/OS/NetBSD/mopd
Fetch the latest and read the
installation instructions.
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The file that should be loaded is called boot.mop and is located in
.Dl \&.../NetBSD-\*V/vax/installation/netboot/boot.mop Ns Ar {50,33}
.Pp
The kernel to load is the same kernel as the miniroot uses and can 
be found in
.Dl \&.../NetBSD-\*V/vax/installation/netboot/netbsd.gz Ns Ar {50,33}
From the install program started in the kernel the rest of the system
can be installed.
There is also a very good FAQ for netbooting VAXen at
.Lk http://world.std.com/~bdc/projects/vaxen/VAX-netboot-HOWTO.html
that describes netbooting of VAXen from many different OS'es.