ISO Download and Deployment

Download the Talos Linux ISO

1. Open the Talos Image Factory in your browser.

2. Configure the image:

   • Hardware type: select Cloud Server.

   • Version: keep the default, which is the latest stable release.

   • Cloud: select Nocloud.

   • Architecture: choose amd64 (the default) or arm64, matching the architecture of the Pextra CloudEnvironment® servers you will deploy to.

   • System extensions: optionally add siderolabs/qemu-guest-agent if you want the QEMU guest agent enabled on the Talos nodes.

   • Leave the remaining customization options at their defaults, unless you have a specific reason to change them.

3. Generate the image and download the ISO.

4. Upload the ISO to Pextra CloudEnvironment®.

Deploy the Talos ISO

Warning

The default CPU model (default) is not sufficient for Talos and will result in a bootloop. If Talos fails to boot into its maintenance environment and repeatedly restarts, first check that the CPU model is set to host-model.

1. Right-click the target node and select Deploy.
2. Fill in the instance name (for example, k8s-talos-demo), set the instance type to QEMU, and image to the Talos ISO you downloaded above. Click Next.
3. Set at least two vCPUs, and 2GiB of RAM (refer to the Talos documentation for resource requirements).
4. Expand Advanced CPU Options. Set the machine type to a q35 variant (for example, q35-5.2) and the CPU model to host-model. Click Next.
5. Attach a disk with at least 10 GiB of storage. Talos installs the complete operating system and Kubernetes components to this disk. Click Next.
6. Attach a network interface to a vSwitch that has access to the internet, with DHCP enabled. This allows the Talos maintenance environment to obtain an IP address for configuration. Click Next.
7. Confirm the configuration and click Finish. Wait for the instance to start.

Next Steps

Proceed to Prepare the Talos node.