Issues With UEFI When Trying To Capture Images

[1337darkin]

I am attempting to capture a Win 11 Pro image using VirtualBox.
I had some issues with the bit always dirtying itself regardless of what I tried, but I got around that using the “chkdsk” tactic, for lack of a better term.

I now have a Golden Image, and I’m able to “capture” it to the FOG server when using “undiononly.kpxe”.

I have now built a UEFI image that I would like to capture, but I can’t get either ipxe.efi or snponly.efi to work. When I attempt to use ipxe.efi, I get an “Exec format error”. When I attempted to use “snponly.efi” (which is what I’ve seen recommended), I get the following:<br> </br>

Any help is appreciated.

[george1421]

@1337darkin My initial reaction is don’t use virtual box, my second thought is don’t use virtual box…

The thing is that vb uses iPXE as its own internal boot loader, and the issue is chaining with FOG’s version of iPXE. The screen shot you show is VB’s version of iPXE running trying to call snponly.efi where its failing. This is an issue with VB and not specifically with FOG.

I think there is a fix for this but I can’t seem to find it at the moment, google-fu is weak today.

On a totally abstract note. You can capture a uefi image with FOG in bios mode. And on the flip side you can capture a bios disk image in uefi mode. BUT to be able to boot that image after image/deployment the target computer’s firmware needs to match the disk image.

[Tom Elliott]

@george1421 This link might help:
https://forums.fogproject.org/topic/10160/virtualbox-pxe-boot-no-configuration-methods-succeeded

it’s the use of EFI booting a PXE booting system:

It’s been a long long time, but VirtualBox back then didn’t have EFI Network booting capability, and I suspect this still may be the case.

May need to adjust the boot options to use boot classes to provide ipxe.pxe for this virtual box host. I don’t recall how to do this right now.

[1337darkin]

@george1421 thanks for the reply buddy. I understand, it’s Friday, so my Google-Fu ix non-existent

I think I understand what you mean, and I was actually generally curious about that as well.
I as able to get that same image captured using “undionly.pxe”. The image was a Win 11 Pro (UEFI/GPT) image, and I was curious if it would apply correctly in this manner, but I’m gathering that as long as the target PC’s firmware matches with the “captured” image’s is, it should work (correct me if I’m wrong).

To make matter more interesting, ALL of those computers I need to image don’t even have Ethernet ports or NICs. I don’t even really want to “fool” with wireless PXE stuff (would take an eternity with their image). Their “fix” was to get docking stations, but crazily enough, Lenovo apparently makes docking stations for laptops without Ethernet ports, which I had personally never seen before until now.

So yeah, I think I may end up just doing this the “traditional” way (not to mention, I didn’t see an option within the BIOS of the Lenovo laptops’ to boot into “BIOS/Legacy”).

I really appreciate you guys and all that you do. It’s been years, but on the bright side, I have a working FOG server that I can use to image for future projects. I sure have missed this tinkering/collaboration. As always, thank you!

[Tom Elliott]

@1337darkin The image can be captured in any state (PXE/UEFI)

But to boot the system, you need it in the “original” state of creating in the image:

For example::

You have a UEFI booted machine, and you capture the Image over PXE (Legacy) network via Virtual Box

That will be fine, as long as the system that boots is booting in UEFI mode. The “boot” mode is the important piece if that helps?