Meet netboot xyz - Network Boot Any Operating System

Posted Nov 11, 2023 Updated Nov 12, 2023

By Techno Tim 7 min read

Imagine all of your favorite operating systems in one place, available anywhere on your network, and you’ll never need to use your flash drive again. That’s the promise of netboot.xyz, a network boot service that lets you install or boot to any operating system simply by booting to the network.

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Disclosures:

• Nothing in this video was sponsored

Don’t forget to ⭐ netboot.xyz on GitHub!

Requirements

• docker (and compose)
• docker machine has a static IP
• dhcp server & access to settings (or install your own)

Docker Setup

See this post on how to install docker and docker compose

Install

create folders netboot_xyz, netboot_xyz/assets, netboot_xyz/config

mkdir netboot_xyz
cd netboot_xyz
mkdir assets
mkdir config

Copy yaml to server or portainer, etc

Container Images

linuxserver.io container image

Parameter Docs

---
version: "2.1"
services:
  netbootxyz:
    image: lscr.io/linuxserver/netbootxyz:latest
    container_name: netbootxyz
    environment:
      - PUID=1000 #current user
      - PGID=1000 #current group
      - TZ=Etc/UTC
      # - MENU_VERSION=1.9.9 #optional, sets menus version, unset uses latest
      - PORT_RANGE=30000:30010 #optional
      - SUBFOLDER=/ #optional
    volumes:
      - ./config:/config
      - ./assets:/assets #optional
    ports:
      - 3000:3000
      - 69:69/udp
      - 8080:80 #optional
    restart: unless-stopped

Official container image

Parameter Docs

---
version: "2.1"
services:
  netbootxyz:
    image: ghcr.io/netbootxyz/netbootxyz
    container_name: netbootxyz
    environment:
      # - MENU_VERSION=2.0.47 # optional, sets menus version, unset uses latest
    volumes:
      - ./config:/config # optional
      - ./assets:/assets # optional
    ports:
      - 3000:3000
      - 69:69/udp
      - 8080:80 #optional
    restart: unless-stopped

Running

bring up stack

docker compose up -d

check to be sure it’s running

➜  netboot_xyz docker ps
CONTAINER ID   IMAGE                                   COMMAND         CREATED          STATUS                  PORTS                                                                                                                 NAMES
83e6c5192156   lscr.io/linuxserver/netbootxyz:latest   "/init"         14 seconds ago   Up 12 seconds           0.0.0.0:69->69/udp, :::69->69/udp, 0.0.0.0:3000->3000/tcp, :::3000->3000/tcp, 0.0.0.0:8080->80/tcp, :::8080->80/tcp   netbootxyz

should see something like:

Check the logs

➜  netboot_xyz docker logs netbootxyz
[migrations] started
[migrations] no migrations found
───────────────────────────────────────

      ██╗     ███████╗██╗ ██████╗
      ██║     ██╔════╝██║██╔═══██╗
      ██║     ███████╗██║██║   ██║
      ██║     ╚════██║██║██║   ██║
      ███████╗███████║██║╚██████╔╝
      ╚══════╝╚══════╝╚═╝ ╚═════╝

   Brought to you by linuxserver.io
───────────────────────────────────────

To support the app dev(s) visit:
netboot.xyz: https://opencollective.com/netbootxyz/donate

To support LSIO projects visit:
https://www.linuxserver.io/donate/

───────────────────────────────────────
GID/UID
───────────────────────────────────────

User UID:    1000
User GID:    1000
───────────────────────────────────────

[netbootxyz-init] Downloading Netboot.xyz at 2.0.73
[custom-init] No custom files found, skipping...
crontab: can't open 'abc': No such file or directory
listening on *:3000
[ls.io-init] done.
4Lg88gNm_wqDORftAAAB connected time=1699460581160

Configuring

You can now browse to the container’s homepage

http://192.168.10:3000/

You should see a list of pxe boot menu items and the option to cache the pre boot environment locally

Local Mirror

If you want to serve the files from a local mirror, you can edit the boot.cfg file from the boot menus

change:

set live_endpoint https://github.com/netbootxyz

set live_endpoint http://192.168.10.125:8080

Keep in mind that you will not be able to boot from any environments you haven’t downloaded.

DHCP Configuration

Since I cannot cover configuring every DHCP service out there, I will cover the basics. Fortunately linuxserver.io has many routers covered as well as the official netboot.xyz docs.

UniFi UDM Pro / SE

Settings > Network > Choose Network > DHCP Service Management > Show Options

Here you’ll want to check “Network Boot” and fill in the server IP and the file name

For me, it’s:

Server IP: 192.168.10.125 Filename: netboot.xyz.kpxe (this is the default BIOS option)

Save.

Preferably we would like to offer a PXE boot per architecture, and UDM supports it however not in the UI. Follow these instructions to do it via CLI

If you’re up to it, here’s my config:

#
# Generated automatically by 
#

# Configuration of PXE boot for '


# The boot filename, Server name, Server Ip Address
dhcp-boot=netboot.xyz.kpxe,netboot.xyz,192.168.10.125

# inspect the vendor class string and match the text to set the tag
dhcp-vendorclass=BIOS,PXEClient:Arch:00000
dhcp-vendorclass=UEFI32,PXEClient:Arch:00006
dhcp-vendorclass=UEFI,PXEClient:Arch:00007
dhcp-vendorclass=UEFI64,PXEClient:Arch:00009

# Set the boot file name based on the matching tag from the vendor class (above)
dhcp-boot=net:UEFI32,netboot.xyz.efi,netboot.xyz,192.168.10.125
dhcp-boot=net:BIOS,netboot.xyz.kpxe,netboot.xyz,192.168.10.125
dhcp-boot=net:UEFI64,netboot.xyz.efi,netboot.xyz,192.168.10.125
dhcp-boot=net:UEFI,netboot.xyz.efi,netboot.xyz,192.168.10.125

Verify

cat /run/dnsmasq.conf.d/PXE.conf

Copy file to /run/dnsmasq.conf.d/PXE.conf on UDM

kill `cat /run/dnsmasq.pid`

You’ll have to do this on each reboot

If you don’t want to do this, you’ll have to change the image file each time.

Booting to network

To boot to the network you’ll need a BIOS and NIC that supports it

• enable in BIOS
  • enable EFI PXE Boot
  • enable Legacy (BIOS) PXE Boot
• Figure out boot override or network boot key
• Power on and boot to network (BIOS of EFI)

See the boot menu, choose OS and go!

Word of caution, there might be some that do not work. This is a moving target. e.g. Ubuntu 23.10 isn’t working for me now, but could soon. Other OS are fine. You may need to try different NICs if you are using virtualization

What about Windows?

Requirements

• Windows 10/11 machine
• Windows ISO
• Windows ADK for Windows 10/11
• Windows PE add-on for the Windows ADK

Windows 11 ADK downloads here

Install Windows ADK for Windows 10/11.

Install Windows PE add-on for the Windows ADK.

Run Deployment and Imaging Tools Environment as administrator from the start menu.

Navigate to folder

cd "..\Windows Preinstallation Environment\amd64"

Mount the Windows PE boot image.

md C:\WinPE_amd64\mount
Dism /Mount-Image /ImageFile:"en-us\winpe.wim" /index:1 /MountDir:"C:\WinPE_amd64\mount"

Copy files

Xcopy "C:\WinPE_amd64\mount\Windows\Boot\EFI\bootmgr.efi" "Media\bootmgr.efi" /Y
Xcopy "C:\WinPE_amd64\mount\Windows\Boot\EFI\bootmgfw.efi" "Media\EFI\Boot\bootx64.efi" /Y

Unmount the WinPE image, committing changes.

Dism /Unmount-Image /MountDir:"C:\WinPE_amd64\mount" /commit

Delete the temp folder that was created earlier (so we don’t get an error when copying)

rmdir /s C:\WinPE_amd64

Create working files

copype amd64 C:\WinPE_amd64

Create a bootable WinPE ISO

MakeWinPEMedia /ISO C:\WinPE_amd64 C:\WinPE_amd64\WinPE_amd64.iso

Then copy the contents of WinPE_amd64.iso to netboot.xyz container’s /assets/WinPE/x64/ folder (need to create folders first)

Then you’ll want to create an SMB share named Windows in your environment. You can create or download a Windows ISO by visiting Microsoft’s site

Once you have created your Windows ISO, you can then extract the files to the root of the Windows share you just created above.

Now we need to configure netboot.xyz

In netboot.xyz UI, update boot.cfg to set win_base_url http://192.168.10.125:8080/WinPE and save.

Now you can PXE boot to the network (be sure you are using the EFI boot image and your device supports UEFI) and then choose Windows from the netboot.xyz menu.

This should boot to a DOS prompt in the Windows Pre-boot Environment

wpeinit

then type

net use F: \\<server-ip-address>\<share-name> /user:<server-ip-address>\<username-if-needed> <password-if-needed>

If you want it to prompt for a username and password, remove the user argument

net use F: \\<server-ip-address>\<share-name>

This will map the F: drive to your Windows share that the Windows ISO extracted

then type

F:\setup.exe

Then hit enter and Windows installer should launch!

I’d love to also automate the mounting of the share however I haven’t found a clean way to do it yet. If you know, let me know in the comments below and I can add it!

Join the conversation

Back in my tech support days I thought that if I had PXE network boot at home, that I "made it". We'll, that day has come! This past week I learned all about netboot xyz! I can now boot and install any operating system over the network!

Check it out! https://t.co/PzPmYzKWLH pic.twitter.com/FQr4W4TPtp

— Techno Tim (@TechnoTimLive) November 11, 2023

Links

⚙️ See all the hardware I recommend at https://l.technotim.live/gear

🚀 Don’t forget to check out the 🚀Launchpad repo with all of the quick start source files