Upload your own ISO and boot a server from it

Besides the public catalog, every account can keep its own installers and live images. You upload an .iso file in the Cloud Panel, we copy it to our storage, and from then on it boots a server like any image from the catalog. It can be OpenBSD, Proxmox, a rescue system, a distribution we do not carry or your own build.

What you can upload

  • Any bootable or data ISO up to 20 GB, from ISO 9660 installers and hybrid images to the UDF media Windows ships on. A driver disc that does not boot, such as virtio-win, works too, attached next to an installer.
  • Five images per account, more on request from the Limits page.
  • Storage is free for every image in the ISO catalog.

Step 1: upload the file

  1. Open ISO catalog in the Cloud Panel sidebar, under Cloud Infrastructure
  2. Press Upload ISO and drop the file into the dialog, or choose it
  3. The name comes from the file name; change it if you like and pick the OS family
  4. Press Upload and keep the tab open until the bar is full

The file goes up in parts. If the connection drops or you close the tab, the upload waits in the list as Upload not finished. Press Resume in the same browser and choose the same file, and it continues from the last part that arrived. An upload nobody finishes is removed after 24 hours.

Step 2: wait for the import

A finished upload shows Waiting for import, then Importing with a percentage. We check that the file really is an ISO image and copy it into the storage your servers boot from; a full DVD takes about a minute. When the status turns Ready, the image can boot a server.

This file is not an ISO image means the file has no ISO 9660 or UDF structure, for example a disk image in another format or an archive. Delete the row and upload a real .iso.

Step 3: create a server from it

  1. Go to Virtual Machines → Create VM and switch the source to Install from ISO
  2. Your images are at the top under Your ISOs, above the public ones. Pick yours
  3. Pick hardware, size and disk, select your network and click Create

The server starts with an empty disk and boots from your image.

Step 4: install over the web console

  1. Open the server's Console tab and click Open Graphical Console
  2. Walk through the installer and install onto the server's disk
  3. Set a user and a password or an SSH key during installation. We never set credentials on a system you installed yourself, so these are the ones you sign in with

A server installed from an ISO has only the graphical console, and its Login Credentials block says so instead of showing a user and an SSH command. Once your system runs SSH and the security group allows it, connect as usual.

Step 5: eject, attach, delete

  • Eject the ISO on the server's page when the installation is done, so the server boots from its disk from then on.
  • Attach an image to a running ISO server at any time from its Console tab, for example a rescue system or a driver disc. Your images are listed next to the public ones.
  • Delete an image from the ISO catalog when you no longer need it. An image that is attached to a server shows Mounted on with the server's name and In use instead of the Delete button, so eject it from that server first. Deleting a server never deletes the ISO it was installed from.

What's next?