VM Client can't PXE boot

[chad-bisd]

Tell me if I’m understanding this correctly.

You have a VM inside a Windows 7 workstation, connected directly to a Cisco 2960 with no other switching/networking gear between the Workstation and the Switch (other than patch panel/patch cables)?

[Adrian-Keith]

There’s also the Linksys WRT54G router attached to this Cisco switch. This thing is completely off of the production network so nothing else attached besides that and other workstations getting imaged.

I guess if I could draw it out it would look like this:

Linksys Router -> Cisco 2960 24 port PoE switch -> Workstations

[chad-bisd]

That WRT54G is a wireless router/ap, and shouldn’t have anything at all to do with FOG. Is your Win7 machine wired to the cisco 2960 and is the FOG server wired to the 2960 also?

[Adrian-Keith]

Yep, that’s correct.

[chad-bisd]

You might try adjusting the portfast or security settings then. The Cisco 2960 may be complaining that it has what looks to be an edge port (single device, no chance of looping) with multiple MAC addresses trying to use that port. This is just a hunch.

[Adrian-Keith]

Thanks, I’ll give this a look. I also found a guide on enabling SPAN/RSPAN to monitor the port. I’ll try this and post what I find.

Also, I don’t believe the FOG server is set up as a DHCP server (I believe that was an option during initial setup?) so the WRT is actually providing DHCP if I remember my setup correctly.

[chad-bisd]

OK. Does the WRT54G allow you to specify the Option 66/67 or next-server-name, filename that is needed to pxe boot or do you have FOG running ProxyDHCP to handle that?

[Adrian-Keith]

I do have that specified and actually, I just figured this thing out. I was going through the steps of enabling SPAN on the port and as I was setting the destination port, the switch didn’t like the port security being on if I was going to monitor it. I disabled switchport security on both ports and bam, the VM boots into the PXE menu.

I don’t know that I really need this feature on anyhow but then again I’m only studying for the CCENT, i’m no network engineer

Thanks for the follow up and support chad. Now if you can spare some time to help me with my other issue

[chad-bisd]

I’ll do what I can. Link me to the other thread.

[Adrian-Keith]

It’s the licensing thing – [url]http://fogproject.org/forum/threads/how-do-you-deal-with-licensing.5560/[/url]

[Ben Warfield]

Hi Adrian,
Did you ever get this fixed? If not… I think I know what’s going on.

The new switch has port security enabled. By default, port security on Cisco switches only allows one mac address per port. The port is allowing the windows 7 machine to connect initially, but blocks your VM when it attempts to connect because the VM has a different mac address.

Try this. On your switch, enter these commands.

en (enter enable mode)
conf t (configure from the terminal)
interface f0/2 (tell it which interface you want to work with)
switchport port-security maximum 2

This tells the switch that you will have 2 mac addresses using this port. You’ll come across this command at some point in your CCNA studies

Let us know if this works!