How to Install Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 Beta

Red Hat recently announced the availability of RHEL 7 Beta. So I figured i'd write up a basic install guide for installing and testing on Virtual Box.

Reference

• Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 Beta Install Guide

Requirements

• Virtual Box (or other VM, RHEV, etc..)
• Red Hat Subscription or Eval Demo
• See Which subscriptions provide access to the Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 Beta download? for complete information on subscriptions or requesting an evaluation copy.
• Time to mess around with RHEL 7

Okay, to get started Red Hat has provided a lot of documentation for RHEL 7 including a blog. Please follow links above to review if you'd like. If not, let's just jump right into the install.

Part I: Prepare VM

1. Build  a VM as you normally would. I'm using Virtual Box and built it with the following specs.
• 20GB HDD
• 2gb RAM
• Single NIC
2. mount the Beta CD then power on.

Part II: Install RHEL 7

1. Press 'enter' at default install splash screen to begin installation. By default it will run a media check but you can press esc to skip.
   
   
2. On the Welcome to Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7.0 Language screen, choose your language then click 'Continue'
   
   
3. On the Notice page for unstable, pre-release software, choose I want to proceed to continue.
   
   
4. RHEL 7 Installation has an 'Installation Summary' screen as shown below. Please set and or configure each items as required. I will perform a base installation with a custom partition scheme. The Installation Summary page is divided into 3 sections
1. Localization
2. Software
3. Storage
   
   
5. Change the TimeZone first as shown
   
   
6. click on the settings gear to enable NTP (Can always configure later)
   
   
7. To make Keyboard or Language changes, choose the related icon in the 'Localization' section and then choose the setting you need.
8. Let's configure the software next and choose come options.  Under the 'Software' section, choose Software Selection
   
   
9. On the Software Selection screen, software is divided into two columns now with Base Environment on the left and Add-On for Selected Environment on the right. There are 10 Base Environments by default and I will select Gnome Desktop.
   
   
10. Click on Done to continue. Normally I wouldn't install the GUI and just install the server. (Desktop or gui can be added later by running the following command: yum groupinstall "X Window System" "KDE Desktop"  or (GNOME Desktop)
    
    
    
    
11. Next Click on the Storage and choose the Installation Destination.  I setup a 21GB HDD VBOX drive in VirtualBox and will use it. 
    
    
    
    
    
12. Once we click on Done on this it will prompt for installation options. Here I will select I want to review/modify my disk partitions before continuing.  I will also select LVM Thin Provisioning for my partition scheme.
    
13. After clicking on Continue, you will be given options to setup up partitions manually or have them created automatically.   I chose to create the partitions manually.  Click on the + sign to Add a partition.
    
    
14. Click the + sign and add each additional partition as needed. I created /boot, /, /home, swap, and /var.  If you're unfamiliar with partitioning you can just select the 'Click here to create them automatically' option.  
    
    
    
15. Review the Partition layout and then click Done.  Notice that the default file system is now XFS
    
    
16. After creating the partitions and clicking done, a Summary of Changes  box will appear. Review the changes and then click  Accept Changes or cancel to make additional changes.
    
    
17. Back on the Installation Summary page, if everything is correct,  click Begin Installation to start the install.
    
    
18. Next, during the installation, you can configure the root password and an additional user if you choose.
    
19. Set root password
    
    
20. Create User with Administrator (root) privileges
    
    
    
    
21. Also can customize the user settings such as UID/GID, Home directory, etc...
    
    
22. Once installation is completed, as usual with previous versions and GUI install, you are asked to reboot.
    
    
23. After reboot, complete the initial setup. Click on the License Information.
    
    
24. Accept the License agreement
    
    
25. Click to Finish Configuration to continue
    
    
26. Configure KDUMP if you would like to. If you choose no, will be required to reboot again.
    
    
27. Register your subscription now or choose to register later.
    
    
28. Login at default login screen
    
    
29. Complete the Gnome setup.
    
    
    
    
    
    
30. Click on Finish to begin using and learning RHEL 7

Please leave any comments and suggestions. I will try to write additional RHEL 7 guides related to new features in future posts.