Retired Techie

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Hodgepodge 3xNAS Part 3 Virtual Install

Published on May 12, 2023 at 6:15 pm by LEW

Introduction

In this post I will be installing Debian 12 (Bookworm) Release Candidate (RC) 2 on a Virtualbox (VB) Virtual Machine (VM).

Because this is not the official release (still a couple of months off) I will not be surprised if there are a few minor problems. Because VB is a software emulation, there may also be issues there.

Generally speaking, and depending on the issue, I will probably not have any lengthy discussions that are not germane to the main point of this post. I don’t want to go down any rabbit holes resolving issues that could be either Debian Testing, VB, or interactions between the two. I will leave deep dives into specific problems for future posts. If I have a work around I will state what it is and just use it.

Spin Up a Virtual Box (VB) Virtual Machine (VM)

We need to get a VM setup (spun up) for our server. At this point in the project I want the server to accessible from my Local Area Network (LAN).

At some point in the future I may spin up a VM router, so I can test various methods of accessing the server behind Network Address translation (NAT) software. This is to simulate an Internet Service Providers (ISP) Carrier Grade NAT (CGNAT). I want to test various methods of getting around/through it, so as to be able to access the server form the Internet. But first I need to get the server working.

I have already posted about setting up a VM in VB (please check here), so I will not cover that here. Instead I will just walk through the steps to get things going.

In the VB interface click on New (blue star).
Give your VM a meaningful name that you will recognize latter.
Select the installer ISO image (in my case debian-bookworm-DI-rc2-amd64-netinst.iso).
You may or may not have the Edition:, Type:, Version: fields available (grayed out) depending on your image. If they are available make sure they reflect what you are installing.
In the case of Debian, there will be a note about unattended install being unavailable. Whether this check box is available will depend on what you are installing. Click Next.
Assign CPU cores and memory to your virtual machine. Avoid the red areas as this will impact you host Operating System (OS). Also chose if you want to enable EFI. Click Next.
Create your Virtual hard drive size. I am only creating one at this point. Pre allocating space will take the whole chunk from you storage pool. Otherwise the drive grabs space as it is needed. Click Next.
Review your parameters and select Finish. This will create your server VM.

After this you can go into Settings and make further adjustments. I highly recommend adding some comments to General → Description.

Just for the record my initial VM has the following parameters; 4 cpu cores, 4 GB memory, Non EFI install, 1 display, 16 MB video memory, VMSVGA Graphics Controller, 20 GB SATAS drive, Bridged network Adapter.

Installing the OS

When we start the VM, it will boot from the ISP we set earlier and run the installer. I will be going through the installation fairy quickly. Please check this post about installing Debian if you want more information, or have additional questions.

The first few things the installer has us set are Language, Country, and key-map. English, US, and American English were my choices.
Some software will load, and the installer will attempt to connect to automatically connect to the Internet using DHCP. At the Host Name prompt select “Go Back”. This will allow you to set the network parameters automatically. You will need to know the IP Address, Netmask, and gateway.
You should now be back at the Host Name. Give yourself a meaningful Host Name. Since this is an initial test on a VB network, there is no domain name.
Next we set the root password, and create a non root user.
Now select a timezone (I used Eastern).
The practitioner will start. Since this is an initial test, I am keeping things simple. Use guided, and all folders in one partition. For an actual production server I would probably break out /home, /var, and /tmp. See this post for a discussion on partitioning. Or this video.
After partitioning is done, select no more source disks. This will be followed by setting up a Debian repository mirror. Pick one that is close to your geographic location. Then set your proxy server if you use one.
Software will start to load. At some point you will be asked about the Debian package popularity survey. Opt in or out at your discretion.
At this point the tasksel program should come up. Unchecked all options before proceeding.
Finally, the grub boot loader will be installed. Once this is done you can reboot into your server.

A Few Bumps Along the Way

There are a couple of issues I noted during this install.

One was the installer refused to work correctly in VB setup as EFI boot, and went to a gray screen. It worked fine under legacy boot. Since this is a proof of concept test, the boot method is not important at this point. So I did a legacy install. I am assuming this will be corrected before actual release in a couple of months.
Manual network setup did not work correctly. I will need to do some research on this, as it may be a VM issue and not an installer issue. Regardless, one of the things I will do in the next post is walk through a manual network setup.

Conclusion

This was a quick run through of setting up a Debian base installation in VB. Again I wish to emphasis that as of this writing, Debian 12 has not been released as stable. I suspect that will happen in a few months.

Also for the record, 1.6 GB of hard drive space has been used so far.

After shutting down the VM, I will clone it, and use the clone for the next post on setting up the server.

Hodgepodge 3xNAS Part 1 Project Overview

Hodgepodge 3xNAS Part 2 Software Choices

Hodgepodge 3xNAS Part 3 Virtual Install

Hodgepodge 3xNAS Part 4 Initial Configuration

Hodgepodge 3xNAS Part 5 Need a GUI?

Hodgepodge 3xNAS Part 6 Add a Storage Drive

Hodgepodge 3xNAS Part 7 SMB/CIFS

Hodgepodge 3xNAS Part 8 Expanded Storage

Hodgepodge 3xNAS Part 10 Cockpit Web GUI RAID 5

Hodgepodge 3xNAS Part 11 Mergerfs