It's more of an issue with the iLO actually resetting during the OS bootup.  Go to HP's website and get a new BIOS to fix the problem. Specifically, you're looking for: Systems ROMPaq Firmware Upgrade for HP ProLiant ML310 G5/DL320 G5p Servers

@wallabybob: Have the looked at the installation screenshots at http://forum.pfsense.org/index.php/topic,7356.0.html? You can find links to quite a bit of documentation (including a link to the above screen shots) by following the documentation link from the pfSense home page: http://www.pfsense.org My recollection (its quite a few months since I last did an installation) is that you boot from the live CD, configure, then select menu item 99 (Install to hard drive) then when done, remove CD and reboot and then, if the installation went well, you will be running off the hard drive. The CD is designed so that you can try  pfSense running off the CD before writing anything to the hard drive. Thank you, that explanation helped alot…

I need to use only the squid and squidguard application for local proxy server so I only need one nic

There's a virtualisation forum with many posts in it that you should read. Key points: Virtualisation will always add a performance overhead - however you shouldn't notice it unless you'd be running the physical hardware at near 100%. Virtualisation introduces security risks since as well as vulnerabilities in the (now virtualised) host you now have vulnerabilities in the virtualisation platform.

@wallabybob: Unfortunately some manufacturers use the same model name for products with different chipsets. It looks like your card might be an example. Since FreeBSD claims to support your card its worth submitting a problem report to see what happens. Ok, thanks. I submitted bug #101.

@0tt0: This also covers my question then, about 1.2.2 -> 1.2.3RC1? Should upgrade via console followed by re-install of all packages be sufficient then? That should work. You can upgrade however you like: console or WebGUI. Reinstall packages after and you should be fine. As always, keep plenty of config backups and some install media handy just in case, but I haven't had one test (or live system) go wrong when upgrading along any part of the 1.2.x branch.

Packages are installed from the Internet, they are not included in the CD image. Click on System -> Packages then click on the "+" to the right of the package description to install the package.

I burned off the lastest snapshot and it has the option to install it via a installer rather than the 99 option. The installer worked and problem is solved!

@mathias: But even though the baud rate isn't set properly you should see some sort of output. Not always.

/32 is ok. What exactly are you trying to achive? screenshots of VIPs, interfaces and NAT please.

Looks like something that might be helped by selecting or deselecting 'packet mode' during setup, or possibly using an alternate boot loader such as grub.

lol…... wood for trees comes to mind. my blinkers were on well and truly there and i failed to spot that. reduced the dhcp range to 62 and away it went. think i got caught out by the way pfsense displays the available range 0-63. may have been better if it said 1-62. but, many thanks for your help as it was starting to do my head in! cheers.

@hugo: I would like to be able to boot my pfSense off my USB key, read in the configuration file, and then copy everything to RAM so that I can remove the USB key. Why? (If I had a bit more context I might be able to make a helpful comment.) @hugo: Obviously, I am not concerned about logging anything. Why not? "No logging" severely limits your ability to find out what went wrong when something goes wrong! If you are anticipating having nothing ever go wrong good luck to you!

Ok thx alot for the answer!

Well.  I couldn't find any definitive information on the net, and none was forthcoming here, so I set up the standard 1.2.3-RC1 installation as described above.  /tmp and /var are on RAM disks, so it looks like writes to the CF card are minimized, at least.  And, it appears I still have VGA, should that be needed.  At any rate, it's working well (< 10% CPU @ 12Mb sustained download; < 20% with three active VPN sessions + streaming video), so I can live with it as is.  Still interested in the specific differences between the embedded image and standard install w/embedded kernel. RH

thanks chaps, i'm now using the net with the PFsense box inplace.. good stuff.. I can tick that off the list of things to do now..