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Chapter 3. Preparing Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization Hypervisor Installation Media

3.1. Preparation Instructions
3.2. Deploying Hypervisors with PXE and tftp
3.2.1. Booting a Hypervisor with PXE
3.3. Preparing a Hypervisor USB Storage Device
3.3.1. Making a USB Storage Device into a Hypervisor Boot Device
3.3.2. Booting a Hypervisor USB Storage Device
3.4. Preparing a Hypervisor from a CD-ROM or DVD
3.4.1. Making a Hypervisor CD-ROM Boot Disk
3.4.2. Booting a Hypervisor CD-ROM
This chapter covers creating installation media and preparing your systems before installing a Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization Hypervisor.
This chapter covers installing Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization Hypervisors on a local storage device. This storage device is a removable USB storage device, an internal hard disk drive or solid state drive. Once the Hypervisor is installed, the system will boot the Hypervisor and all configuration data is preserved on the system.

3.1. Preparation Instructions

The rhev-hypervisor package is needed for installation of Hypervisors. The rhev-hypervisor package contains the Hypervisor CD-ROM image. The following procedure installs the rhev-hypervisor package.
Entitlements to the Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization Hypervisor (v.6 x86-64) channel must be available on your Red Hat Network account to download the Hypervisor image. The channel's label is rhel-x86_64-server-6-rhevh.

Beta Release Channels

Beta releases of the Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization Hypervisor are distributed using an alternative channel. Beta releases consist of pre-release software. They must not be used in a production environment.
The channel required to obtain beta releases of the Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization Hypervisor is the Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization Hypervisor Beta (v.6 x86-64) channel, also referred to by the identifier rhel-x86_64-server-6-rhevh-beta in Red Hat Network.
Downloading and Installing the RPM Package
The Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization Hypervisor package contains additional tools for USB and PXE installations as well as the Hypervisor ISO image.
You can download and install the Hypervisor either with yum (the recommended approach), or manually. In either case, the Hypervisor ISO image is installed into the /usr/share/rhev-hypervisor/ directory and named rhev-hypervisor.iso.
The rhevh-iso-to-disk and rhevh-iso-to-pxeboot scripts are now included in the rhev-hypervisor6-tools sub-package. They are installed to the /usr/bin directory.

Note

Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.2 and later allows more than one version of the Hypervisor ISO image to be installed at one time. As such, rhev-hypervisor.iso is now a symbolic link to a uniquely-named version of the Hypervisor ISO image, such as /usr/share/rhev-hypervisor/rhevh-6.2-20111006.0.el6.iso. Different versions of the Hypervisor ISO can be installed alongside each other, allowing administrators to run and maintain a cluster on a previous version of the Hypervisor while upgrading another cluster for testing.
Procedure 3.1. Downloading and installing with yum
  1. Subscribe to the correct channel

    Subscribe to the Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization Hypervisor (v.6 x86_64) channel on Red Hat Network.
    # rhn-channel --add --channel=rhel-x86_64-server-6-rhevh
    Refer to the Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization Installation Guide if you need further assistance registering with Red Hat Network or subscribing to other channels related to virtualization: http://docs.redhat.com/docs/en-US/Red_Hat_Enterprise_Virtualization/3.0/html/Installation_Guide/.
  2. Install the Hypervisor

    Install the rhev-hypervisor6 package.
    # yum install rhev-hypervisor6
Procedure 3.2. Downloading and installing manually
  1. Download the latest version of the rhev-hypervisor* package from Red Hat Network. The list of Hypervisor packages is located at https://rhn.redhat.com/rhn/channels/PackageList.do?cid=12058.
  2. Install the RPM on a Red Hat Enterprise Linux system. You must log in as the root user and navigate to the location of the downloaded file to perform this step.
    # yum localinstall rhev-hypervisor*.rpm
BIOS Settings and Boot Process Troubleshooting
Before installing Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization Hypervisors it is necessary to verify the BIOS is correctly configured for the chosen installation method. Many motherboard and PC manufacturers disable different booting methods in the BIOS. Most BIOS chips boot from the following devices in order:
  1. 3.5 inch diskette
  2. CD-ROM or DVD device
  3. Local hard disk
Many BIOS chips have disabled one or more of the following boot methods: USB storage devices, CD-ROMs, DVDs or network boot. To boot from your chosen method, enable the method or device and set that device as the first boot device in BIOS.
Most but not all motherboards support the boot methods described in this chapter. Consult the documentation for your motherboard or system to determine whether it is possible to use a particular boot method.

Warning — BIOS Settings Vary Between Manufacturers

BIOS settings vary between manufacturers. Any specific examples of BIOS settings may be inaccurate for some systems. Due to this inconsistency, it is necessary to review the motherboard or system manufacturer's documentation.
Confirm Hardware Virtualization Support
Verify that your system is capable of running the Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization Hypervisor. Hypervisors require that virtualization extensions are present and enabled in the BIOS before installation proceeds.
  1. Boot the Hypervisor from removable media. For example, a USB stick or CD-ROM.
  2. Once the Hypervisor boot prompt is displayed, enter the command:
    : linux rescue
    
  3. Once the Hypervisor boots, verify your CPU contains the virtualization extensions with the following command:
    # grep -E 'svm|vmx' /proc/cpuinfo
    
    Output displays if the processor has the hardware virtualization extensions.
  4. Verify that the KVM modules load by default:
    # lsmod | grep kvm
    
    If the output includes kvm_intel or kvm_amd then the kvm hardware virtualization modules are loaded and the system meets the requirements.