[How to] Install 3CX ISO on OVH's VPS

[Alphabetic]

Last updated: 29/08/2024

This is more for the benefit of me. However, I thought people might like to install their 3CX's with the ISO rather then using the old command lines.

You will need:-

- 3CX ISO
- OVH VPS LE YOU MUST CHOOSE DEBIAN 10 DISTRO OR YOU'LL GET GRAPHICS ERROR
- VNC Viewer (Im using UltraVNC)


Buy your VPS from OVH then reboot it in rescue mode

Use the login details from the email or you can grab them from the login screen on the KVM.



SSH to the VPS using Terminal/Powershell

ssh root@<IP> -L 5900:localhost:5900

Unmount and delete all partitions on HDD​

note you may have more/less partitions to delete

umount /dev/sdb1
fdisk -u /dev/sdb
d
d
w

Install KVM & download 3CX ISO​

sudo apt-get clean all
sudo apt-get update
apt install qemu-kvm

For v18

wget -P /dev https://downloads-global.3cx.com/downloads/debian10iso/debian-amd64-netinst-3cx.iso

For v20

wget -P /dev https://downloads-global.3cx.com/downloads/debian12iso/debian-amd64-netinst-3cx.iso

Start up the KVM​

For v18

qemu-system-x86_64 -netdev type=user,id=mynet0 -device virtio-net-pci,netdev=mynet0 -m 1024 -enable-kvm -drive index=0,media=disk,if=virtio,file=/dev/sdb -vga qxl -vnc 127.0.0.1:0 -daemonize -cdrom /dev/debian-amd64-netinst-3cx.iso -boot once=d

For v20

qemu-system-x86_64 -netdev type=user,id=mynet0 -device virtio-net-pci,netdev=mynet0 -m 1024 -enable-kvm -drive index=0,media=disk,if=virtio,file=/dev/sdb -vga qxl -vnc 127.0.0.1:0 -daemonize -cdrom /dev/debian-amd64-netinst-3cx.iso -boot once=d

Note: Any trouble with QEMU then kill it off and start it again.

pkill qemu

Connect to KVM with VNC Viewer​

Once logged in, connect to the machine with VNC Viewer using localhost:5900 as the address.

Run through the set up​

You may get disconnected off the VNC, just connect back up again and run through set up.



The server will reboot and the VNC will get disconnected. Give it a few minutes and connect back up with VNC.

If you cannot get connected with VNC then reboot the VPS in normal mode and continue the set up via OVH KVM (typically happens with v20 on LE VPS)


Once to get to here, select option 1 and reboot the VPS in to normal mode.






Finish off set up.



Caveats:

Check that GRUB has installed to the correct disk otherwise Debian security updates will cause update failures when 3CX attempts them.

debconf-show grub-pc | grep install_devices

If this shows its attached to /vda then this needs correcting.

# Correct GRUB installation target
echo "grub-pc grub-pc/install_devices multiselect /dev/sda" | debconf-set-selections
echo "grub-pc grub-pc/install_devices_disks_changed multiselect /dev/sda" | debconf-set-selections

# Install GRUB to the correct disk
grub-install --target=i386-pc /dev/sda

# Regenerate boot configuration
update-grub

# Complete any pending package configuration
DEBIAN_FRONTEND=noninteractive dpkg --configure -a

# Verify configuration
debconf-show grub-pc | grep install_devices

Return first check and it should report the correct disk.

 

[mgi1]

This is a great guide! I've been able to follow and execute this a few times. My biggest problem that I have is with doing the umount command. I get a "target is busy" message. Is there a way to make sure the root user is not using the /dev/sdb1 mount?

 

[openvoip]

Yes - use "umount -l /dev/sdb1"

 

[openvoip]

And it is a great guide, thank you Alphabetic

 

[mgi1]

Yes - use "umount -l /dev/sdb1"

This isn't a good option. The command works but you won't be able to finish the rest of the steps.

 

[Alphabetic]

This isn't a good option. The command works but you won't be able to finish the rest of the steps.

Forget unmounting it isnt neccessary in rescue mode.