Installing Debian on the APU2

This is a short post detailing the install of Debian on the PC Engines APU2 using PXE.

First of all you'll need to ensure you are running version 160311 or newer BIOS. You can find the BIOS update details here. If the PXE options are missing then there's a good chance you aren't running a new enough BIOS!

Connect to the system's console via the serial port using a baud rate of 115,200. I typically use screen on Linux/macOS or PuTTY on Windows.

Start the APU2 and press Ctrl+B when prompted to enter iPXE, or choose iPXE from the boot selection menu (F10).

Attept boot from PXE using DHCP:
iPXE> autoboot

If all is well you will get to the "Debian GNU/Linux installer boot menu" heading, press TAB to edit the Install menu entry.

This should bring up something along the lines of:
> debian-installer/amd64/linux vga=788 initrd=debian-installer/amd64/initrd.gz --- quiet

You'll want to define the serial console by adding the console parameter to the end (and preseed parameter if used):
> debian-installer/amd64/linux vga=788 initrd=debian-installer/amd64/initrd.gz --- quiet console=ttyS0,115200

Press enter and you should be on your way!

PXE boot Debian using RouterOS as PXE server

I would typically use a Linux server for the purposes of PXE booting, but this is so straightforward it's a very attractive option. I'm using a MikroTik RB2011 (RouterOS v6.34.6) successfully.

This example assumes your router's LAN IP is 172.16.8.1 and the local subnet is 172.16.8.0/24.

First of all, download the netboot archive to a Linux machine (I'm using a Raspberry Pi here):
tim@raspberrypi /tmp $ wget http://ftp.au.debian.org/debian/dists/jessie/main/installer-amd64/current/images/netboot/netboot.tar.gz
tim@raspberrypi /tmp $ wget http://ftp.au.debian.org/debian/dists/jessie/main/installer-amd64/current/images/SHA256SUMS

Check that your archive matches the checksum file:
tim@raspberrypi /tmp $ grep `sha256sum netboot.tar.gz` SHA256SUMS
SHA256SUMS:460e2ed7db2d98edb09e5413ad72b71e3132a9628af01d793aaca90e7b317d46  ./netboot/netboot.tar.gz

Extract the archive to a tftp directory:
tim@raspberrypi /tmp $ mkdir tftp && tar xf netboot.tar.gz -C tftp

Copy tftp folder to the MikroTik:
tim@raspberrypi /tmp $ scp -r tftp admin-tim@172.16.8.1:

On the MikroTik, configure TFTP on MikroTik with a base directory of /tftp (omitting req-filename matches all):
[admin-tim@MikroTik] /ip tftp add ip-address=172.16.8.0/24 real-filename=tftp

Configure DHCP for PXE booting:
[admin-tim@MikroTik] /ip dhcp-server network set [ find address=172.16.8.0/24 ] boot-file-name=pxelinux.0 next-server=172.16.8.1