Installing Oracle Solaris by Using Installation Media

Oracle Solaris can be installed 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 11.1 Systems.

  The GUI installer cannot upgrade your operating system. The default GUI installer settings are described in Default Settings With the GUI Installer in Installing Oracle Solaris 11.1 Systems.

  To install the OS by using either the Live Media or the text installer, download the installation media from:

  http://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 by using the usbcopy utility. To use the usbcopy utility, you must first install the pkg:/install/distribution-constructor package. See How to Perform a GUI Installation in Installing Oracle Solaris 11.1 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 installation can use the entire disk. If the whole disk option is chosen, 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 11.1 Systems. If you use the text installer, you might have to install additional software packages afterwards. See Adding Software After Text Installation in Installing Oracle Solaris 11.1 Systems.

  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 Perform a Text Installation Over the Network in Installing Oracle Solaris 11.1 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. See Creating a Custom AI Manifest in Installing Oracle Solaris 11.1 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 11.1 Systems.

  For more information, see Installing Oracle Solaris by Using AI.

You can also create custom Live Media images, text installer images, and AI images. See Creating a Custom Oracle Solaris 11.1 Installation Image.

The following installation features are no longer supported:

• Oracle Solaris Flash Archive Installation – You can restore root pool snapshots to recover from a failed system or devices. See System Boot, Recovery, and Platform Changes.

• JumpStart feature of Oracle Solaris – The Automated Installer replaces this feature. See Transitioning From Oracle Solaris 10 JumpStart to Oracle Solaris 11.1 Automated Installer.

Oracle Solaris 11.1 Installation Media Paths

The media paths for the Oracle Solaris 11.1 installers are as follows:

x86 only: Live Media

Oracle_Solaris-11_1-Live-X86

SPARC: Interactive text installer

Oracle_Solaris-11_1-Text-SPARC

x86: Interactive text installer

Oracle_Solaris-11_1-Text-X86

SPARC: Automated Installer

Oracle_Solaris-11_1-AI-SPARC

x86: Automated Installer

Oracle_Solaris-11_1-AI-X86