1

I am trying to get a Debian VM running on my Arch Linux machine using headless QEMU/KVM. To begin, I boot the virtual system with the following command:

qemu-system-x86_64  \
    -cdrom ../iso/debian-10.6.0-amd64-netinst.iso  \
    -boot order=d  \
    -m 16  \
    -smp 20  \
    -name deb  \
    -vnc :1  \
    -drive file=deb.img,format=raw

Then I connect to the VNC server that was started so that I can go through Debian's install options (my intention is to only SSH into the system once it is setup, thus the reason for a headless machine). I am using TigerVNC, so connecting to the server looks like the following:

vncviewer localhost:1

This all seems to work great - I can see the Debian GNU/Linux installer menu and I can move the selection bar up and down. I can also visit submenus and the Help menu. However, I can't do anything beyond that. My end goal is to do an Expert install but when I hit ENTER with that option selected (or any other install option, for that matter) nothing happens. If I hit ENTER repeatedly, occasionally the screen flickers, but I don't get much beyond that.

Do you have any advice on how I can trouble-shoot this issue or do you have a direct solution to get the system installed?

peachykeen
  • 115
  • 1
  • 5
  • 1
    Why do you run qemu manually and not using libvirt? This is just going to cause you a lot of avoidable pain and suffering. Go [install libvirt and virt-manager](https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Libvirt). – Michael Hampton Oct 09 '20 at 00:13
  • Thank you @MichaelHampton I will look into using this. :) – peachykeen Oct 09 '20 at 00:22
  • alternative: use virt-manager GUI through a deported X display (ssh -X root@archlinuxhost ; virt-manager& ). Drawback: require a correct network bandwidth. – Chaoxiang N Oct 09 '20 at 06:37
  • @MichaelHampton using `libvirt` and `virt-install` fixed my issue...somehow. I am able to connect to the machine over VNC and run through the graphical install menus. If you want to write your comment up as an answer, I will accept it and close this topic. – peachykeen Oct 09 '20 at 18:16

0 Answers0