Booting from the network requires that you have a network connection and a TFTP network boot server (DHCP, RARP, or BOOTP).

The installation method to support network booting is described in the section called “Preparing Files for TFTP Net Booting”.

On machines with OpenBoot, simply enter the boot monitor on the machine which is being installed (see the section called “Invoking OpenBoot”). Use the command boot net to boot from a TFTP and RARP server, or try boot net:bootp or boot net:dhcp to boot from a TFTP and BOOTP or DHCP server.

The easiest route for most people will be to use an Ubuntu CD. If you have a CD, and if your machine supports booting directly off the CD, great! Simply insert your CD, reboot, and proceed to the next chapter.

Note that certain CD drives may require special drivers, and thus be inaccessible in the early installation stages. If it turns out the standard way of booting off a CD doesn't work for your hardware, revisit this chapter and read about alternate kernels and installation methods which may work for you.

If you have problems booting, see the section called “Troubleshooting the Installation Process”.

Most OpenBoot versions support the boot cdrom command which is simply an alias to boot from the SCSI device on ID 6 (or the secondary master for IDE based systems).

If you cannot boot because you get messages about a problem with “IDPROM”, then it's possible that your NVRAM battery, which holds configuration information for you firmware, has run out. See the Sun NVRAM FAQ for more information.