setup of a headless-system: boot without a keyboard, mouse, screen


Recommended Posts

hi there - good day dear community

 

 

the question of  today: setup of a headless-system: boot without a keyboard, mouse, screen

 

 

I recently put together a pc to use as a server.

 

 

The pc uses an GigaByte B460 HD3 mainboard.

 

the system should be able to boot with

- having no keyboard attached.

- having no screen attached

- having no mouse attached

 

 

question: Do i have to do some  BIOS change here… or so I thought?

As far as I can tell from examining every setting in the BIOS is that the system allready is able to boot - with or without keyboard attached...  

in other words - it does not matter if i

 

- connect the keyboard or disconnect it....

 

Anyone know of a way to make sure that this will work surely - and what about the setup that takes care that all boots well with

 

- having no screen attached

- having no mouse attached



Note: i need to have a setup that is able to propperly boot with any of the devices above mentioned:

in other words: i  need  the computer will be able to boot without the mouse and monitor and the keyboard.

 

Do i need to have to enter BIOS to change settings to achieve this behavior,


Some friends mentioned: You will have to plug in the monitor to see what is going on. Once you have it booting without the mouse and keyboard, then unhook the monitor.

 

btw: we can call this a headless-system: 

 

cf: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Headless_computer: A headless computer is a computer system or device that has been configured to operate without a monitor (the missing "head"), keyboard, and mouse. A headless system is typically controlled over a network connection,

 

 

look forward to hear from you

You will need a keyboard. mouse and screen to get your system setup, and prep it for RDP when you need to.

I do that already for my plex server. So, it also depends on your operating system. If windows, you will have to allow logon without user intervention, you will get security risk flags.

I also have a dongle that imitates a screen plugged in, which is needed for transcoding in my case.

 

hello dear sulphy - many many thanks -  the question is. 

 

do i need to do some settings  in the bios to achieve the headless config . or in other words - to set up the behavior that the system boots with out any keyboard

 

 

hello many many thanks for the quick answer.

well generally the system shold say ... after booting.

no os found - since there is no os on the drive...(allready installed)

see the start of the system...

https://photos.google.com/share/AF1QipPg3RAsXWpUAx7KdTuzM0L7zv5iTRrx8S2yjBLCEh1nSXf5hEj-X1aLRaJHtxhfYA/photo/AF1QipPG27nQI1KPlVCmLYtUwQODFp-xsCCZcx85go6t?key=LXkzeWY5UWxYcEcxS3hTcWFYZjFxajQ5QThuMU93

  On 02/09/2020 at 11:22, tarifa said:

As far as I can tell from examining every setting in the BIOS is that the system allready is able to boot - with or without keyboard attached...  

Expand  

This may seem like a crazy idea, but how about you just unplug the keyboard/mouse/screen and press the power button and see what happens!

Hello,


You can plug a CRU Mouse Jiggler MJ-3 into an available USB port to simulate the presence of a mouse. 

Search Amazon (or your favorite online marketplace) for "HDMI+Dummy+Plug" for devices to simulate the presence of an HDMI monitor.

 

Regards,

 

Aryeh Goretsky

 

Some motherboard firmwares of the 90s would prevent booting if there was no keyboard, it'd give an error like "No keyboard detected. Press F1 to continue" and yes that message really was as silly as it sounded. Motherboards of today should be fine.

  • Like 1

good day dear Mindovermaster, DaveLegg, Sulphy, Jared-, goretsky, n_K, good day


first of all: many thanks for your reply - great to hear from you .  


note: i want to make sure that the system is remote-admin-ready 


in other words: we need a Remote Server Administration. 


my friend does take care for the remote admin job. The machine goes into a colocation center - there i am going to replace the old server. 
note; this old server has got two hdds with the operating sytem on it. 

at the moment i just want to make sure that all is set in place so that i did not miss anything in the preliminary steps.  In other words: i am pretty sure that 
the machine is able to get administered remotely.. /(after being placed in the colo-center ... and of course after the two hdds (with the os)...

Mindovermaster: As I understand it, It's on the OS side, nothing to do with your BIOS/EUFI.

thanks Mindovermaster: well i think all goes well now. 


DaveLegg:This may seem like a crazy idea, but how about you just unplug the keyboard/mouse/screen and press the power button and see what happens!

yupp: youre right DaveLegg. 


Sulphy: You will need a keyboard. mouse and screen to get your system setup, and prep it for RDP when you need to.
I do that already for my plex server. So, it also depends on your operating system. If windows, you will have to allow logon without user intervention, you will get security risk flags.
I also have a dongle that imitates a screen plugged in, which is needed for transcoding in my .....

Sulphy. well i think that the setup goes okay.. - see below. 


Jared: This isn't anything complex.... I've been doing this for years.

thank you Jared for encouraging me. 


goretsky: ou can plug a CRU Mouse Jiggler MJ-3 into an available USB port to simulate the presence of a mouse. 
Search Amazon (or your favorite online marketplace) for "HDMI+Dummy+Plug" for devices to simulate the presence of an HDMI monitor.


n_K: Some motherboard firmwares of the 90s would prevent booting if there was no keyboard, it'd give an error like "No keyboard detected. Press F1 to continue" and yes that message really was as silly as it sounded. Motherboards of today should be fine

n_k right - i fully agree;)

 

 

 

i just gathered some materials form the Mainboard  the GigaByte B460 HD 3  - https://download.gigabyte.com/FileList/Manual/mb_manual_b460-hd3_e_v1.pdf 

 

how do you like this.!? 

 

 

 

__###___bios__1.jpg

__####___bios_2.jpg

  On 05/09/2020 at 10:17, tarifa said:

well generally the system shold say ... after booting.

no os found - since there is no os on the drive...(allready installed)

Expand  

I'm not sure that I follow. With what you have written here you will receive the same message regardless of if there is a mouse, keyboard and monitor attached or not.

 

You can't power up the computer and remotely connect to the BIOS. You need to have an OS installed before you can do anything with the computer (other than using it as a large paperweight).

good day dear nick 


 

  Quote

 

my friend does take care for the remote admin job. The machine goes into a colocation center - there i am going to replace the old server. 
note; this old server has got two hdds with the operating sytem on it. 

at the moment i just want to make sure that all is set in place so that i did not miss anything in the preliminary steps.  In other words: i am pretty sure that 
the machine is able to get administered remotely.. /(after being placed in the colo-center ... and of course after the two hdds (with the os)...

Mindovermaster: As I understand it, It's on the OS side, nothing to do with your BIOS/EUFI.

thanks Mindovermaster: well i think all goes well now. 

 

Expand  

 

sure thing - youre right 

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
  • Posts

    • @Raze Bold it boy. (I admit, we all did it from time to time..)
    • Fan Control V227 by Razvan Serea Fan Control is a powerful and versatile portable utility that allows you to monitor, control and customize the fans of your GPU and CPU to keep your machine cool and running smoothly. Fan Control supports a wide range of devices and hardware configurations, giving you complete control over your computer's cooling system. Fan Control backend is mainly based on LibreHardwareMonitor, an open source fork of the original OpenHardwareMonitor. This means that hardware compatiblity is entirely open for anyone to contribute, and doesn't rely on a single developer who may stop caring at some point. Combined with the plugin system, Fan Control is unlocked for many generations of hardware to come. Main features Guided setup process on first launch Save, edit and load multiple profiles Change the theme and color of the application. Multiple temperature sources ( CPU, GPU, motherboard, hard drives... ) Multiple fan curve functions, including a custom graph Mix fan curves or sensor togethers (max, min, average) Low resource usage Advanced tuning with steps, start %, stop %, response time and hysteresis FanControl V227 changelog: Allow decimal with hysteresis values Radeon Pro support through ADLX Fix a bug when cancelling the graph editing dialog Update LibreHardwareMonitorLib Download: FanControl V227 | Installer ~15.0 MB (Open Source) View: Fan Control Homepage | Screenshot Get alerted to all of our Software updates on Twitter at @NeowinSoftware
    • Lol tf you are talking about. People are PAYING by using this app exclusively, just indirectly. Do you have any idea how much facebook charges for api access to WhatsApp which has become more or less a monopoly in e-commerce.
    • My kid tried, so I took her to Microcenter and showed her the differences in price as well as storage and specs. We bought a Windows machine. She loves it, and is off to college this fall with her gaming level windows laptop at the price of a Mac that came with a 512GB SSD, and half the RAM.
    • Hasleo Backup Suite Free 5.4.2.1 by Razvan Serea Hasleo Backup Suite Free is a free Windows backup and restore software, which embeds backup, restore and cloning features, it is designed for Windows operating system users and can be used on both Windows PCs and Servers. The backup and restore feature of Hasleo Backup Suite can help you back up and restore the Windows operating systems, disks, partitions and files (folders) to protect the security of your Windows operating system and personal data. The cloning feature of Hasleo Backup Suite can help you migrate Windows to another disk, or easily upgrade a disk to an SSD or a larger capacity disk. System Backup & Restore / Disk/Partition Backup & Restore Backup Windows operating system and boot-related partitions, including user settings, drivers and applications installed in these partitions, which ensures that you can quickly restore your Windows operating system once it crashes. Viruses, power failure, or other unknown reasons may cause data loss, so it is a good habit to regularly back up the drive that stores important files, you can at least recover lost files from the backup image files in the event of a disaster. System Clone / Disk Clone / Partition Clone Migrate the Windows operating system from one disk to another SSD or larger disk without reinstalling Windows, applications and drivers. Clone entire disk to another disk and ensure that the contents of the source disk and the destination disk are exactly the same. Clone a partition completely to the specified location on the current disk or another disk and ensure that the data will not be changed. File Backup & Restore Back up specified files(folders) instead of the entire drive to another location to protect your data, so you can quickly restore files(folders) from the backup image files when needed. Incremental/Differential/Full Backup Different backup modes are supported, you can flexibly choose data protection schemes, which can improve backup performance and save storage space while ensuring data security. Delta Restore Delta restore uses advanced delta detection technology to check the changed blocks on the destination drive and restore only the changed blocks, so it has a faster restore speed than the traditional full restore. Universal Restore This feature can help us restore the Windows operating system to computers with different hardware and ensure that Windows can work normally without any hardware compatibility issues. Hasleo Backup Suite 5.4.2.1 changelog: The program crashes when sending emails Application notifications cannot be displayed in the Windows Notification Center Updated Italian and German translations Fixed other minor bugs Download: Hasleo Backup Suite 5.4.2.1 | 33.9 MB (Freeware) Links: Hasleo Backup Suite Website | Hasleo Backup Suite Guide | Screenshot Get alerted to all of our Software updates on Twitter at @NeowinSoftware
  • Recent Achievements

    • Contributor
      GravityDead went up a rank
      Contributor
    • Week One Done
      BlakeBringer earned a badge
      Week One Done
    • Week One Done
      Helen Shafer earned a badge
      Week One Done
    • First Post
      emptyother earned a badge
      First Post
    • Week One Done
      Crunchy6 earned a badge
      Week One Done
  • Popular Contributors

    1. 1
      +primortal
      660
    2. 2
      ATLien_0
      266
    3. 3
      Michael Scrip
      235
    4. 4
      Steven P.
      164
    5. 5
      +FloatingFatMan
      150
  • Tell a friend

    Love Neowin? Tell a friend!