Proxmox 5.0 VE Install Crash / Hang

[Greatsamps]

Hi Guys,

We are starting to evaluate the product for use in our production KVM environment but are having difficulties even installing.

We are installing on a Dell PowerEdge R820 with a PERC H710 RAID Controller.

Boot via the iDrac and get to the initial splash screen. Upon choosing the install (either normal or debug), it starts. We get to the Initial Ramdisk section where it pauses for a few seconds. The screen then resets, goes blank and that is the end of the story.

We are using the latest ISO downloaded this morning.

We have previously tested on a Dell R710 with a PERC 6/i controller and it worked OK, but this is being tested for production usage.

Any ideas?

 

[jim.bond.9862]

not 100% sure but it sounds like a driver problem and iDrack problem at the same time.
when you say "Boot via the iDrac" do you mean remote console with ISO mounted as virtual drive?
if yes, try burning the ISO onto DVD and boot from that. I run into similar issue trying to install Windows server 2012 on my old DELL R310. it would not boot from USB, well it would boot but went into black screen short after booting.
and even when I made a DVD it had issues as drivers were not available on latest ISO. I had to slipstream the raid controller drivers into ISO AND burn the real DVD for it to work.
similar issues with my R730dx servers when trying to boot using iDrac remote console. had to burn and boot from physical media, virtual drive would not work. you can do most of the thing in remote console once you boot up but do need to boot via physical media. luckily I got the servers with DVD drives as I had no external in the office.

so I say try burning USB stick first and see if it works. also (if possible.) attach keyboard/monitor directly and see if you can install via local console other than remote.

also check BIOS settings. some times if you boot in UEFI mode OS install will not work. when I was testing Proxmox 5 in VM I could not install in Hyper-V gen2 VM. even with UEFI mode turned off it would not boot.

 

[Greatsamps]

Hi,

Thanks for the quick response!

Yes booting via the iDrac mounted as a virtual drive, none of our servers have DVD drives and are 100's of miles away, so it is the only option. I should also add, that server is running the "latest and greatest" bios and raid firmware.

I have just double checked and 100% booting via BIOS rather than UEFI.

It would be good to know what the next step is after the RAMDISK.. also a little alarming that it is just failing with no errors, not particularly helpful when trying to diagnose issues!

 

[jim.bond.9862]

well the thing is it may not be just falling, it may simply hung up on something and it maybe possible that if you wait long enough it would comeback with some error. but you can try a few things.
first read this https://pve.proxmox.com/wiki/Debugging_Installation to start.

also not sure if it is too much of a hassle, but trey to install Debian 9 first. if it works you can load Proxmox on a pre installed Debian just as easy.

 

[Greatsamps]

Thanks for the reply, good news is that i have exactly the same problem with a Debian install ... bad news is that i have exactly the same problem with a Debian install!

 

[jim.bond.9862]

well at least we know it consistent.

try https://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/203768/debian-8-kvm-guest-loading-initial-ramdisk


also try loading verbose mode on boot by pressing 'e' on boot screen and follow this steps.
you can even add nomodset to the end of the line at the same time and see if that helps.

• Find the line that starts with linux. This line contains the kernel command line. Remove the option quiet from that line, and nothing else. (if you accidentally do remove something else, just hit esc and start over).
• Once you've made the above change, press ctrl+x to execute the script without saving it.