Installing Oracle Solaris by Using Installation Media

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You can install an Oracle Solaris 11 release by using any of the following installation methods:

x86: Live Media

The installer on the Live Media ISO image is for x86 platforms only. The Live Media installs a GUI desktop. Also, the Live Media requires more memory than the text installer. The exact memory requirements vary for each system. See Oracle Solaris Installation Requirements.

If you are installing on x86 platforms that will run multiple operating systems, you can partition your disk during the installation process. See Partitioning Your System in Installing Oracle Solaris 11.3 Systems.

The default GUI installer settings are described in Default Settings With the GUI Installer in Installing Oracle Solaris 11.3 Systems.

To install the OS by using the Live Media or the text installer, download the installation media from https://www.oracle.com/technetwork/server-storage/solaris11/downloads/index.html

You can copy the downloaded image to removable media, such as a USB drive or burn it to a DVD. USB images require the usbcopy utility to copy the bootable ISO image to a USB flash drive. In this release, USB installation media is also available for SPARC platforms. To use the usbcopy utility, first install the pkg:/install/distribution-constructor package. For instructions on creating a persistent device alias for a USB stick on a SPARC based system, see How to Create a Persistent Device Alias for a USB Flash Drive on a SPARC System in Installing Oracle Solaris 11.3 Systems.
Interactive text installer

The text installation media contains a set of software that is more appropriate for a general-purpose server. The text installer can perform an installation on an existing Oracle Solaris x86 partition or on a SPARC slice. Or, the text installer can use the entire disk. If the whole disk option is selected, a partition or slice is created to cover the targeted device. In either case, the installation overwrites everything on the targeted partition or slice. See How to Perform a Text Installation in Installing Oracle Solaris 11.3 Systems. If you use the text installer, you might need to install additional software packages afterwards. See Adding Software After a Text Installation in Installing Oracle Solaris 11.3 Systems.

Note - The text installer installs the solaris-large-server package set. However, if you use the text installer over the network, the solaris-autoinstall package set is installed. After booting the installed system, you should install the solaris-large-server package set.

If you are set up to perform an automated installation over the network, you can also perform an interactive text installation over the network. When using this method, you can only install a single system at a time. However, you can modify installation specifications by using the interactive selections. See How to Start a Text Installation Over the Network in Installing Oracle Solaris 11.3 Systems.
Automated installations that boot from media

You can boot an AI image from media or a USB device to initiate a hands-free installation of just that system. An AI manifest provides installation instructions for the system. You can use the interactive AI manifest wizard to simplify AI manifest creation. See Creating an AI Manifest Using the AI Manifest Wizard in Installing Oracle Solaris 11.3 Systems. The system must have the minimum amount of required memory and adequate disk space. Also, the system must have network access so that software packages can be retrieved from an IPS repository on the Internet or on the local network. This step is required to complete the installation. See Installing Using AI Media in Installing Oracle Solaris 11.3 Systems.

You can also create custom Live Media images, text installer images, and AI images. See Creating a Custom Oracle Solaris 11.3 Installation Image.

Note - After installing your system, you cannot update it by using a method that is similar to any Oracle Solaris 10 upgrade methods. An Oracle Solaris system is updated based on your desired maintenance schedule and by using the pkg command. See Adding and Updating Software in Oracle Solaris 11.3 and Updating to Oracle Solaris 11.3 for more details.

Before updating to Oracle Solaris 11.3, see Issues When Updating to Oracle Solaris 11.3 in Oracle Solaris 11.3 Release Notes.

The media paths for the Oracle Solaris 11.3 installers are as follows:

x86 only: Live Media – sol-11_3-live-x86.iso, sol-11_3-live-x86.usb
SPARC: Interactive text installer – sol-11_3-text-sparc.iso, sol-11_3-text-sparc.usb
x86: Interactive text installer – sol-11_3-ai-x86.iso, sol-11_3-ai-x86.usb
SPARC: Automated Installer – sol-11_3-ai-sparc.is, sol-11_3-ai-sparc.usb
x86: Automated Installer – sol-11_3-text-x86.iso, sol-11_3-text-x86.usb

Note - Media paths might vary if you are downloading from a location other than the Oracle Technical Network, for example, from My Oracle Support or the Oracle Software Delivery Cloud.