Netboot / Flashing Globe / Option Key Works

[danielo]

I'm trying to get Netboot working in our Lab so that I can setup autorun for reimaging. I have the NetSUS server on the same subnet, and if I reboot a workstation and hold the Option key down, it lets me select Faux Network Boot Disk, and it boots up. However, if I create a policy and have the computers restart and boot to 'Netboot', all I get is the flashing globe. I've also tried creating a script:

sudo bless --netboot --server bsdp://xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx --nextonly

It gave me the flashing globe as well.

I'm am using a freshly created 10.7.4 NBI. Any help?

[daworley]

How long are you letting the flashing globe go for?

The globe is used when the system is discovering or locating the next portion of the boot sequence. The flashing globe is for getting DHCP and discovering the BSDP service. High network traffic or collisions or what have you can slow down the discovery process, and it can seem excruciatingly slow.

For some reason, it does seem that the Startup Preference Pane finds the NetBoot resource faster than Startup Manager. My gut instinct is that a booted mac already has TCP/IP sorted and all it has to do is find BSDP.

[danielo]

Wow, thanks for the quick response!

I've had 2 of them flashing for about 4 hours now :(

It's all setup on a Fiber network that is on a different subnet from everything else, so there shouldn't be any interference. All that is on here is 2 mac servers, the NetSUS appliance, and 26 workstations.

[gregp]

Interesting... we're seeing similar problems.

Which model Mac do you have?

I've been testing NetBooting from MBP2,2, MBP5,2, MBA5,2, and Macmini5,3.

We have a NetBoot server running 10.4.11 serving 10.6.8, 10.7.4, and 10.8 NBIs. The routers have this one configured in the ip helper config.

Also have several other NetBoot servers, running 10.5.8, 10.6.8, 10.7.4, and 10.8.

When testing to the 10.6.8 NetBoot server (that's only hosting a 10.8 NBI, and that NBI works fine via some methods):

The MBP2,2 NetBoots fine (it won't fully boot the image, but it does start the boot loader then stops because 10.8 isn't supported on MBP2,2.)

The other machines are grab bag of success. Some will NetBoot fine with Startup Disk but not using bless. One of them refuses to NetBoot by any method. Another one blinked with the globe until I powered it off. I forget which models do what at the moment.

All were tested to the same ethernet cable to the same switch port and all have the latest EFI revision.

Over the past year, we used NetBooting to allow our users to upgrade from Leopard to Snow Leopard at their convenience with Self Service and that worked without issue (that was to a 10.6.2 NBI). The NetBoot server used for that was our 10.6.8 server, that isn't configured in the ip helper config on the routers (we didn't want anyone finding this, as the NBI auto logs in and runs Casper Imaging, then gets reimaged).

However, it appears some of these new models are unhappy NetBooting.

Grabbed tcpdumps of various points in the testing (from the NetBoot servers and the clients, and the clients when trying bless & Startup Disk). Didn't see anything obvious, so opened a ticket with Apple and sent them a bunch of data to analyze.

In the tcpdump for the mini when using bless to the secondary server, can see it sending a DHCP Inform to the server and the server responds with a DHCP Ack. Then it boots to the HD. It gives up quickly. Yet, it will boot the same 10.8 NBI that's on our primary with Startup Disk and its happy as can be.

Since Startup Disk seems to be more successful, I'm wondering if something else needs to be set that bless doesn't set (in a similar way of how we can no longer manipulate nvram directly for setting/unsetting the EFI password, but now have to use a special program).

While this doesn't have a fix for you, but it does seem to indicate it may be more widespread.

[danielo]

We have all MacPro 5,1, and two XServes. Workstations are all Lion 10.7.4, and Servers were SL 10.6.8. We are using the NetSUS appliance for net booting.

Apparently, all of my machines were stuck searching on the en0, and I was trying to get it to boot from en1, since we have two separate networks. I finally found the command in the bless manual to specify en1, and it worked perfectly. I have since moved the NetSUS back to our en0 network, and it works with the bless command as well. We have also upgraded our servers to Mountain Lion 10.8, which I don't recommend doing. DHCP is ridiculous. But, it's all working, and we haven't had any other problems. We were forced to upgrade because of the XSan not being backward compatible with the controllers. As in, the servers have to be on the same or higher version than the clients, and we didn't realize that until after we upgraded everything to Lion.

I don't think this really helps you, but this was my experience. Good luck!