Network Boot of Rock Pi 4?

#1

We have just added Network boot support for the RPi3B+ to our about to be released TLXOS 4.6.0

This can potentially save a lot of money as no storage is required on the Network booted RPi’s

We are hoping that the Rock Pi 4 has been designed with this option also?

The user just installs TLXOS on a RPI, then uses the Management Software or local configuration menu to enable PXE boot Server mode on that RPi, this takes about a minute to configure.

I have been testing this Diskless booted mode on the RPi3B+ while watching the load on the PXE Server RPi which is basically zero CPU most of the time.

I love the Diskless boot performance on the RPi3B+, it will be outstanding on the Rock Pi 4 :slight_smile:

#2

Yes, ROCK Pi 4 supports PXE booting and we have tested it. I am not sure what Diskless boot refer but for ROCK Pi 4, we need a small SPI flash on the board and without eMMC/SD Card/NVMe/USB disk for PXE booting.

#3

Please confirm that the small SPI flash is always fitted to the Rock Pi 4?

Then if we boot the board without eMMC/SD Card/NVMe/USB fitted, the board will attempt to PXE boot?

If so, this is very good as all a USER will need to do is to configure PXE Server mode on one Rock Pi 4 board, and then any Rock Pi 4’s that are PXE booted on the same Subnet will load TLXOS in less than a Minute, see attached image on using the ThinLinX Management Software to enable PXE Server mode on a TLXOS device

We PXE boot a Kernel and initrd, then mount the filesystems over the Network using ATA over Ethernet which is very efficient but only works on the same Subnet.

Thanks Jack

TLXOS%20PXE%20Server%20Configuration

1 Like
#4

@jack Any chance you guys have the document about pxe boot on the rock pi 4?

#5

No problem. We will put the pxe boot on the wiki.

#6

Here is how to boot PXE on ROCK Pi 4 with Linux Server:

https://wiki.radxa.com/Rockpi4/dev/u-boot/pxe

#7

Hi,here is a new uboot,please update and test
https://dl.radxa.com/rockpi4/images/loader/spi/

#8

@jack @brian Many thanks, guys.

#9

In the wiki page, pxe boot requires serial console connection and manual intervention every time to select pxe mode and set tftp ip address, is there way to fix the mode and ip information so every time the rockpi restarts it will still automatically boot from tftp?

#10

Yeah I thought PXE was automatic, or at least configure and leave… If you need to set it to be on every time what’s the point?