The software described in this documentation is either in Extended Support or Sustaining Support. See https://www.oracle.com/us/support/library/enterprise-linux-support-policies-069172.pdf for more information.
Oracle recommends that you upgrade the software described by this documentation as soon as possible.
A Driver Update Disk (DUD) provides a mechanism for delivering updated device drivers during system installation. On some systems, hardware may not be fully supported for an Oracle Linux release. In these cases, a DUD may be released at a later date, to facilitate installation on newer hardware.
DUDs may be released by Oracle and made available on the Oracle Software Delivery Cloud or through Oracle Support, as modules become available for previously unsupported hardware. The DUD is usually released in the form of an ISO.
During installation, the installer can load the updated device driver kernel modules from the DUD so that it can access the devices and install the required RPM packages, containing the alternate device drivers, on the target system. This allows the installation of Oracle Linux to proceed smoothly on systems with hardware that may not have been initially supported at the time of the Oracle Linux release.
Writing the DUD ISO to the wrong device may result in data loss. Check that you reference the correct device node when you copy the image. Use the lsblk utility to help you to identify the different disks block devices on your system.
Use the dd command line utility to transfer the DUD image to an alternate storage device:
# dd if=/path/to/DUD.iso of=/dev/sdX
Replace /path/to/DUD.iso with the
path to access the DUD ISO file. Replace
/dev/sdX with the device node that
belongs to the storage media that you intend to use for the DUD.
Typically, you might use a USB disk for this purpose.
To use the DUD during installation, boot from the standard Oracle Linux installation media as you normally would, but additionally, attach the media with the DUD image before the installer starts. The installer should automatically recognize the DUD and use it. You might be prompted to select which drivers you want to install.
Some versions of BIOS may fail to identify the installation media when multiple USB storage devices are connected. Therefore, it is recommended that you insert the DUD USB media as soon as the boot process starts. For example, attach the disk when the system is at the GRUB boot prompt.
The kernel that is used by the installer might not include support for USB 3.0. When using the DUD on USB media, ensure that you use a USB 2.0 compatible port to connect the USB media to the system.
It is also possible to manually specify the location of the DUD
before the installer boots, which makes it possible to host the
ISO at an alternate location, such as a web server or an NFS
server, and helps to facilitate kickstart installations, where
the DUD might be required. To manually specify the location of
the DUD, edit the boot parameters to include
inst.dd=,
where locationlocation is the URL or path to
the device where the DUD can be accessed.
To access the boot parameters in the boot menu when you are running a manual installation, press either the E key (UEFI-based systems) or the Tab key (BIOS-based systems) to display a prompt that enables you to edit previously defined boot options and add your own boot options. See Section 2.1.1, “Starting the Installation” and Section 2.2, “Installation Boot Options” for more information.
If you intend to use the DUD during a kickstart installation,
use the driverdisk installation option in
your kickstart file to specify the location of the disk. For
example, to install from an attached block device, use the
following location:
driverdisk /dev/sdb1
Or, to install from a network location, use the
--source switch:
driverdisk --source=http://www.example.com/dd.isoThe installer supports the use of HTTP, FTP, and NFS as sources for network-hosted DUD images.