bootp/lftp installation of SLES for SAP 11 SP4 on IBM Power8 LPAR fails with error !BA017021!

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Environment

SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for SAP Applications Service Pack 4

Situation

A Network install of SLES 11 SP4 for SAP Applications for IBM Power E870 on a LPAR (Power8) from an AIX 7.1.4.1 NIM server fails.

During the bootp/tftp boot the error !BA017021! is thrown.

Resolution

For POWER8+ SUSE does not use "inst64" (big size) for the installation any more.

With SLES 11 SP3+ onwards IBM & SUSE started building a separate linux64 & initrd64 for the installation.

The bootfile on DVD1/suseboot/inst64 is bigger than 12MB and can not be booted directly via network anymore.

To load the installation kernel via network, the following files:

yaboot.ibm
yaboot.cnf
linux64

have to be copied from the DVD1/suseboot directory to the TFTP server.

Rename the yaboot.cnf file to yaboot.conf.

yaboot can also load configuration files for specific Ethernet MAC addresses. Use a name like:

yaboot.conf-01-23-45-ab-cd-ef

to match a MAC address.

This is an example yaboot.conf for TFTP:

default=sles11
timeout=100
image[64-bit]=linux64
    label=sles11
    append="quiet install=nfs://hostname/exported/sles11dir"

Cause

Disclaimer

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