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2.2. Making Minimal Boot Media

A piece of minimal boot media is a CD, DVD, or USB flash drive that contains the software to boot the system and launch the installation program, but which does not contain the software that must be transferred to the system to create a Red Hat Enterprise Linux installation.
Use minimal boot media:
  • to boot the system to install Red Hat Enterprise Linux over a network
  • to boot the system to install Red Hat Enterprise Linux from a hard drive
  • to use a kickstart file during installation (refer to Section 32.9.1, “Creating Kickstart Boot Media”
  • to commence a network or hard-drive installation or to use an anaconda update or a kickstart file with a DVD installation.
You can use minimal boot media to start the installation process on 32-bit x86 systems, AMD64 or Intel 64 systems, and Power Systems servers. The process by which you create minimal boot media for systems of these various types is identical except in the case of AMD64 and Intel 64 systems with UEFI firmware interfaces — refer to Section 2.2.2, “Minimal USB Boot Media for UEFI-based Systems”.
To make minimal boot media for 32-bit x86 systems, BIOS-based AMD64 or Intel 64 systems, and Power Systems servers:
  1. Download the ISO image file named rhel-variant-version-architecture-boot.iso that is available at the same location as the images of the Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.9 installation DVD — refer to Chapter 1, Obtaining Red Hat Enterprise Linux.
  2. Burn the .iso file to a blank CD or DVD using the same procedure detailed in Section 2.1, “Making an Installation DVD” for the installation disc.
Alternatively, transfer the .iso file to a USB device with the dd command. As the .iso file is only around 200 MB in size, you do not need an especially large USB flash drive.

2.2.1. Minimal USB Boot Media for BIOS-based Systems

Warning

When you perform this procedure any data on the USB flash drive is destroyed with no warning. Make sure that you specify the correct USB flash drive, and make sure that this flash drive does not contain any data that you want to keep.
  1. Plug in your USB flash drive.
  2. Find the flash drive's device name. If the media has a volume name, use it to look up the device name in /dev/disk/by-label, or use the findfs command:
    findfs LABEL=MyLabel
    If the media does not have a volume name or you do not know it, you can also use the dmesg command shortly after connecting the media to your computer. After running the command, the device name (such as sdb or sdc) should appear in several lines towards the end of the output.
  3. Become root:
    su -
  4. Use the dd command to transfer the boot ISO image to the USB device:
    # dd if=path/image_name.iso of=/dev/device
    where path/image_name.iso is the boot ISO image file that you downloaded and device is the device name for the USB flash drive. Ensure you specify the device name (such as sdc), not the partition name (such as sdc1). For example:
    # dd if=~/Downloads/RHEL6.9-Server-x86_64-boot.iso of=/dev/sdc