No your conclusions are correct. Technically you could modify the image furnished by PXE/TFTP so that it already has your settings, but there would be no way of saving the changes back to PXE server, so this would not be very useful for you. While PXE/TFTP probably isn't very useful for your "diskless" workstation aspirations, it could still be used for LiveCD images such as Hiren's, Clonezilla, ReDo Backup, Ultimate Boot CD, Parted Magic, etc, so your efforts with PXE/TFTP may still prove useful to you (albeit not in the manner you expected).wasalph wrote:Mr. Wilson,
yup, your scripts had help a lot, I was able to successfully load up Ubuntu like a live CD, just have to change some entries so to match my setup like folder structure and ip address of the qnap. After all these trials, I can see how this QNAP "feature" can be of help, unfortunately, not the one I am looking for.
What I was expecting to have is a setup that loads the workstation's OS from the QNAP. Whatever changes will be save back into the QNAP. Because I'm looking for a diskless setup wherein my notebook and a desktop will have no HDD anymore. And that I only need to buy one UPS for QNAP's use, the notebook's battery already die of age while my desktop is kinda old, so I dont want to spend on upgrading both. A WinXP, Ubuntu or any lightweight Linux distro should be sufficient for my needs, coz what I need is a spreadsheet and document editor (Libreoffice) and printer driver that would print to the HP laserjet that is connected to the QNAP (shared printer).
After successfully loaded up Ubuntu (using your scripts), I went ahead changing settings, wallpaper, theme etc. only to find out after reboot all these settings are gone, so basically its just like loading a live CD....unless there is a way to "save the changes"??
I have successfully used my QNAP/PXE configuration for booting to a XBMC LiveCD image in order to make "diskless" XBMC HTPC's. (I have since switched to Android Mini-PC's running XBMC for Android , so I no longer use PXE for this purpose, as Android Mini-PC's are completely silent, unlike my diskless HTPC's).
I wonder if it is possible to support "diskless" workstations via iSCSI. (I'm no expert on iSCSI, so I honestly don't know if this is possible. Unfortunately you posted to my pre-existing PXE thread, rather than asking about "diskless" workstations, so I had no idea what you were trying to accomplish.
Booting an Operating System over the networks isn't very efficient anyway, so you might find it preferable to simply install small SSD drives in your PC's for the Operating System. You could always "mount" NAS shares on your PC via Samba for your PC "data". Small SSD's are relatively cheap, and silent. This is what I do here. My PC's all have patheticly small HDD or SSD drives in them for my Operating Systems. My NAS is where I store all my data, as it is protected by RAID5 and regular automated Backups. When a HDD dies in my PC, I simply replace it, re-install the Operating System, and then reconnect my Samba shares from the NAS. (I store almost no data on my PC's at all),
The "Home Folders" feature of the NAS is useful for this purpose.