Mid 2012 MacBook won't netboot or boot image

jwhitaker
New Contributor

Hi JAMF Folks, We just got in some shiny new MBPs. We attempted to netboot one of these to a 10.7.4 netboot image and the unit never boots (just hangs at the gray apple). The interesting thing is that the machine itself is running 10.7.3. I'm guessing that this some build specific issue.

We managed to sneak our image onto one computer via another machine and target disk mode. This image is 10.7.4. The computer will not boot the image, we get the "slash" symbol on the screen.

Anyone seeing this or found a solution? I am grateful for any feedback.

Best,
JW

1 ACCEPTED SOLUTION

jhbush
Valued Contributor II

You can also just use the latest 10.7.5 developer build in the meantime if you have a paid Apple Developer Account otherwise:

Downloading Hardware Specific Lion InstallersBy Josh Wisenbaker August 11, 2011 6:20 pm With the change to the Mac App Store for delivery of OS X, Apple has stopped putting install media in the box with your shiny new Mac. If you want to re-install the OS then you use the Recovery HD and it installs right from the Mac App Store. This presents a challenge for people with managed system deployments as you never have an installer disk for new hardware that comes out after whatever is on the Mac App Store for download until the next release. There is away around this though to get a nice fresh copy of the installer for whatever new hardware you have. Read on for more…The Mac App Store is Smart The Mac App Store is smart enough to know what kind of hardware is requesting an re-install of Lion. By looking at the type of Mac and serial number it will then push down the InstallESD.dmg for that hardware directly to your computer. Then the Mac restarts from the image it downloaded and re-installs OS X. This is great for your mom to re-install Lion with, but it also deletes the image after it's done installing. What you need to do is grab that InstallerESD.dmg before it has a chance to do away with it. Mac Sysadmins are Smarter It's very easy to use the Mac App Store's smarts to our own advantage and gain access to a copy of that hardware specific OS build. Here's what to do: Ew8TJHUsm1tsFKTiDCsR Now when you mount that external disk you will find a directory named Mac OS X Install Data on the root. Inside of this folder is the elusive,hardware-specific, InstallerESD.dmg image that you can feed to SIU or any other imaging tool of choice. Having this installer will now allow you to build out re-deployment images for all of your hardware until rollup installers are available.

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12 REPLIES 12

bbass
Contributor

The latest machines have custom builds of 10.7.4.

The "normal" 10.7.4 build number is 11E53. The build numbers for the MBAs and MBPs are as follows:

MBA: 11E2705
MBP: 11E2617

You will need to build custom nbi's for both and then special images, too. Unless, of course, you want to go with true modular imaging.

jhbush
Valued Contributor II

You can also just use the latest 10.7.5 developer build in the meantime if you have a paid Apple Developer Account otherwise:

Downloading Hardware Specific Lion InstallersBy Josh Wisenbaker August 11, 2011 6:20 pm With the change to the Mac App Store for delivery of OS X, Apple has stopped putting install media in the box with your shiny new Mac. If you want to re-install the OS then you use the Recovery HD and it installs right from the Mac App Store. This presents a challenge for people with managed system deployments as you never have an installer disk for new hardware that comes out after whatever is on the Mac App Store for download until the next release. There is away around this though to get a nice fresh copy of the installer for whatever new hardware you have. Read on for more…The Mac App Store is Smart The Mac App Store is smart enough to know what kind of hardware is requesting an re-install of Lion. By looking at the type of Mac and serial number it will then push down the InstallESD.dmg for that hardware directly to your computer. Then the Mac restarts from the image it downloaded and re-installs OS X. This is great for your mom to re-install Lion with, but it also deletes the image after it's done installing. What you need to do is grab that InstallerESD.dmg before it has a chance to do away with it. Mac Sysadmins are Smarter It's very easy to use the Mac App Store's smarts to our own advantage and gain access to a copy of that hardware specific OS build. Here's what to do: Ew8TJHUsm1tsFKTiDCsR Now when you mount that external disk you will find a directory named Mac OS X Install Data on the root. Inside of this folder is the elusive,hardware-specific, InstallerESD.dmg image that you can feed to SIU or any other imaging tool of choice. Having this installer will now allow you to build out re-deployment images for all of your hardware until rollup installers are available.

mm2270
Legendary Contributor III

The 6 or 7 (at least) other discussions that have been started on this same topic are good examples of why JAMF Nation needs a "sticky list" or current trending topics list that we can all see when we first land here. it would prevent yet another topic being started on the same thing.
Don't get me wrong jwhitaker, I'm not blaming you. Topics can get lost too quickly here and it would be great if some of the ones that are affecting nearly everyone could always float near the top or to a special list.

donmontalvo
Esteemed Contributor III

Apple KB HT1159 covers these builds:

Mac OS X versions (builds) for computers
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1159

external image link

Not sure why, but Apple decided to put the Model Identifier and Model Number (sometimes referred to as Order Number) on separate pages...see the links at the bottom of the above KB. For example MacBook Pro:

How to identify MacBook Pro models
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4132

external image link
external image link

I believe if you custom order any Mac computer, the Model Number (or Order Number) changes to some rediculous value like Z0xxxxx/x.

[color=green]Apple makes some amazing products, but sometimes I wonder if the folks trying to manage these critial KB articles are are hanging out in Marijuanaville...[/color]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S70pmpkBkk0

--
https://donmontalvo.com

jwhitaker
New Contributor

Thanks for the replies folks. This makes for an interesting challenge.

talkingmoose
Moderator
Moderator

Does your base OS image include non-Apple items? If not then you should be able to apply everything to your MBPs except an OS and use the OS that shipped with the machine (do not erase first).

This does give you less control over partitioning but so long as you're using a modular approach to imaging then applying just your third party packages and scripts will give you the same results as completely imaging the drive.

jafuller
Contributor

@talkingmoose: that would be a great solution, but our company requires PGP encryption which is broken on these new MBP/Air models.

PGP gets to bootguard, then to grey screen. No OS X login prompt.

I would prefer the thin imaging approach, but these "security" products always get in our way.

khoppenworth
New Contributor

Hello! I'm having the same issue here with the boot that hangs at the grey apple and am confused as to where to begin to fix this problem. I'm continuing this thread instead of starting a new one because I didn't see where there was a solution for this.

I have a new MBP Mid-2012, Build 11E2617, Model MD103xx/A.

I created a brand-new base image and NetBoot image from this machine as instructed in the JAMF articles. I used the Casper NetBoot action and System Image Utility on the same machine to create the NetBoot image. I moved the NetBoot .nbi folder over to the server and NetBooted the new MBP.

The MBP NetBooted with no problems and went through the initial imaging steps with no issues. However, when it was supposed to reboot to do the first run stuff, it rebooted and hung at the grey apple screen. I've rebooted a few times and that's all I get.

I had my imaging process set up to erase the HD and create the Recovery HD partition, as detailed in the JAMF article. So now even if I try to boot to the Recovery HD it gives me the NO/circle-slash sign.

Just for kicks, I imaged an older (2009) MacBook in the same way, and the same thing happens where it seems to run through imaging okay, but at reboot, hangs at the grey apple.

I have seen a few things about using the installESD something for making Lion images, but at this point I have no idea what I am *supposed* to be doing for imaging new machines. I follow the JAMF articles to a T but then I see all sorts of other/extra info on the forums, so I am not sure what the correct procedure is. For instance, I didn't even know that I was supposed to run System Image Utility on the new machine until it took hours to save (and never complete) the NetBoot image from another Mac running 10.7.4. Luckily, I happened to find this discussion thread: https://jamfnation.jamfsoftware.com/discussion.html?id=4814 which has a response from JAMF support at the bottom that indicates a completely different process than what is detailed in the JAMF Articles.

Definitely not JAMF bashing or anything - I love them! I am just really confused as to what I need to be doing now to get new machines imaged. :( Any direction would be greatly appreciated. I'm posting here first before I talk to JAMF support since I saw this thread going, but please let me know if you think this is isolated and I need to talk to them.

Thanks, everyone!

- Kristine

stevewood
Honored Contributor II
Honored Contributor II

@khoppenworth have you tried only installing the base image on the machine? Create a new configuration in Casper Admin and call it "test" or whatever you want. Add only the base image you created into that config. Boot the machine off of the NetBoot and run the config against the machine.

Does it boot all the way? If so, you might have a problem with a package that is being installed at imaging time. And if that is the case, the only way I know of to fix that is to test your config adding a few packages at a time until the "hang" is reproduced. I will generally "halve" my packages until I find the culprit. If that doesn't make sense let me know and I'll expand on that.

khoppenworth
New Contributor

Hm... so, imaging with the base-image-only config half worked.

NetBooted fine. Imaging process ticked along. Rebooted to the login screen with the admin account listed.

I entered the admin user account password and it hung at the login screen. The password field had the password dots in it, but the dots were greyed out and the clock in the upper-right froze.

I shut down the computer manually and turned it back on. Now, at the login screen, I see not only my admin account, but a user account (this was still plugged in my autorun data; did not realize this), and the "Other..." login option. I tried to log into the admin account and the same thing happened where it froze as soon as I hit enter after typing the password. :(

Should I just start all over? And if so, how should I start over? I don't have another machine of this same model.

BTW, one more odd thing: I NetBooted my older MacBook (2009) to the same imaging server but chose a config with ONLY my 10.6.8 base image in it, which has been used successfully and not altered for a while now. Same deal - the computer gets done going through the imaging process, reboots.... and only the Admin account shows up, not the account I have entered for creation in the autorun data. :( The admin user on this machine logs in just fine. So after I log in, I restart the machine and suddenly the autorun-entered user account is created. Any idea what is going on with the user account not being created until an additional reboot?

I am on Casper 8.52, btw. Server is 10.6.8. Machines are set to Erase Target Drive and Reboot to Target Drive When Done.

khoppenworth
New Contributor

FYI I just reimaged with the base-image-only config just in case and it's still doing the freeze-at-login thing.

khoppenworth
New Contributor

There's some other craziness going on here. I can't even get to the internet recovery option. I've got a ticket in to Apple. Thank you!