Redirect Console to Serial (Lanner FW-7585)

[boxerboys]

I've got NGFW/Untangle up and running on FW-7585. This appliance has no video output; so for the installation I used VirtualBox to install on the raw disk attached via USB and then moved the SSD to the appliance. This works fine; appliance boots and everything seems to be working. However, because there is no video interface on the FW-7585, I am looking to redirect the console to serial as opposed to VGA/Video. I found a few links, but nothing that seems to work.

For what it's worth, I did the installation using the normal ISO and also the Serial Install ISO. Both "work", but neither has any sort of redirection to serial. I get the bootup sequence on serial and then just black screen once Untangle loads up.

Appreciate any thoughts/pointers on how this is done for any headless appliance. I can live without it I suppose, just wanted to have local console access.

Thanks

[bcarmichael]

The Serial ISO is designed specifically for this purpose. It outputs to the serial interface during install and after the OS loads. It does not load any graphical UI, only a command line interface. Note that the operating system uses S0 at 115200 baud rate. You may find this help article to be useful. https://support.untangle.com/hc/en-u...Serial-Console

[boxerboys]

Thanks; that is what I assumed as well. The appliance is up and running, but I still don't see the proper output through the serial/console port on the 7585. I tried both the default console port and also the serial over Ethernet option the appliance has (which is eth8). Neither seem to work.

I saw some posts to a reference to a post that doesn't exist/work anymore, but that might be old. If using the serial install, is there any change I need to do to the boot options? I saw this old post; is this relevant? https://forums.edge.arista.com/forum...serial-console

[bcarmichael]

It's loading the GUI and that's why you see a blank screen. You need to install the serial console version from the ISO directly onto the device.

[boxerboys]

Thank you bcarmichael. I understand that part and in fact, the appliance is now fully installed and functional......and i can access it over the network without issue. I was hoping to also gain console access to it for basic troubleshooting if necessary. For headless appliances (not official Arista branded), is that supposed to happen if I used the serial ISO install?

[bcarmichael]

I was hoping to also gain console access to it for basic troubleshooting if necessary. For headless appliances (not official Arista branded), is that supposed to happen if I used the serial ISO install?

.

Yes. The serial installer specifically does not load the graphical UI. Instead it loads the command line UI that you can see in the KB article that I linked in my previous reply. The serial installer was introduced in version 16.5 https://wiki.edge.arista.com/index.php/16.5_Changelog so it is relatively new.

[boxerboys]

Thanks; looks like it might be an issue with my hardware then as it still won't show anything on the console after the system POST finishes. I'll update the thread for future reference if I am able to get it to work; but to be honest I've not needed any sort of local access to my existing install in 4+ years, so probably not worth the time.

[boxerboys]

bcarmichael; I was just impatient. As you suggested, the blank screen wss just while the OS loaded. I now have the logon prompt at with the console port working just fine.

Thanks!

[bcarmichael]

Great news! Thanks for following up and confirming that the serial output is working.

[zeastom]

I was hoping to also gain console access to it for basic troubleshooting if necessary. For headless appliances (not official Arista branded), is that supposed to happen if I used the serial ISO install?
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vidmate 2014

[boxerboys]

zeastom; I am not sure to be honest. This seemed to work OK on my first install that I started this thread on (it was a FW-7585). However, I did another install using the serial ISO install on a FW-7551 and it does not work the same. I am not sure if it is a hardware difference/issue or if I did something different on my installation. If you have found the answer on your own, please share the information.

[pctechs]

You may want to verify that it booted up with some indications that the kernel would output to a tty / rs232 / serial port:

cat /proc/cmdline

Look for anything related to tty, serial, console, baud.
On one Arista switch, i have used the to check on the baudrate, bits, flowcontrol, etc.... extraneous stuff deleted:

arista1#bash cat /proc/cmdline | egrep --color=always -i '(console|tty|serial)'
crashkernel=512-4G:34M,4G-8G:41M,8G-:53M nmi_watchdog=panic tsc=reliable reboot=p log_buf_len=1M usb-storage.delay_use=0 pti=off CONSOLESPEED=9600 tsc=reliable pcie_ports=native reboot=p log_buf_len=1M console=ttyS0 systemd.show_status=0 systemd.default_standard_output=tty