Environment
Novell SUSE Linux Enterprise
Server 10
Novell SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 9
Novell SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 8
Novell Open Enterprise Server (Linux based)
Novell SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop 10
Novell openSUSE
Novell SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 9
Novell SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 8
Novell Open Enterprise Server (Linux based)
Novell SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop 10
Novell openSUSE
Situation
Background
Sometimes it is necessary to gather system information like hwinfo from a system which has no operating system installed yet.This may be the case in terms of general installation problems where the hardware is unknown.
Goal
Gather information about the hardware which may give a hint as to what exactly is causing the installation issue.
Sometimes it is necessary to gather system information like hwinfo from a system which has no operating system installed yet.This may be the case in terms of general installation problems where the hardware is unknown.
Goal
Gather information about the hardware which may give a hint as to what exactly is causing the installation issue.
Resolution
Follow these steps to gather
hardware information for a system which does not have an operating
system installed yet and to store this information on a USB stick
or floppy drive or over the network to another system.
Using a floppy
The procedure above can also be used with a USB stick (pen drive) instead of a floppy, with the following changes/notes:
If the procedures above cannot be applied, another system can be used to store the hardware information, as follows:
Using a floppy
- Insert the first CD or DVD of the Novell Linux product. If service packs have been released for the product, use of the CDs/DVDs of the current service pack is preferred.
- Boot from the DVD or CD.
- In the boot loader menu, choose "rescue system".
- Run the commandhwinfo > /tmp/hwinfo.txt
- Insert a floppy disk into the drive and run the commandsmount -rw /dev/fd0 /media/floppy
cp /tmp/hwinfo.txt /media/floppy
umount /media/floppy - The required data are now available on the floppy disk. The
system can be powered down or reset at this point.
The procedure above can also be used with a USB stick (pen drive) instead of a floppy, with the following changes/notes:
- The device name for a USB
stick will not be /dev/fd0; instead, it will
be recognised as a SCSI disk device /dev/sdX.
- Make sure the USB stick is
not connected before the rescue system is available. Consult the
output of the command dmesg to identify the
precise device name, e.g. /dev/sda.
If the procedures above cannot be applied, another system can be used to store the hardware information, as follows:
- Insert the first CD or DVD of the Novell Linux product. If service packs have been released for the product, use of the CDs/DVDs of the current service pack is preferred.
- Boot from the DVD or CD.
- In the boot loader menu, choose "rescue system".
- Run the commandhwinfo --netcardThis shows the name of the driver for the network card, e.g. bnx2. Write this module name down.
- Reboot the system, boot from DVD or CD and choose "manual installation".
- Choose the language and the keyboard setting.
- Select the appropriate network card module and configure the
network card withifconfig eth0 your-ip-address
- After that go back to the rescue system.
- Back in the rescue system run the command:hwinfo> /tmp/hwinfo.txt
- Copy the new file (/tmp/hwinfo.txt) to
another machine in the network using scp:scp /tmp/hwinfo.txt remoteusername@other-system's-ip-address:/tmp/