Dell 3040

[JMacavali]

I am having trouble getting a Dell 3040 to image. It looks like it starts the pxe boot. Says 'succeeded to download npb file but then starts the windows welcome process and doesn’t image.

I’ve tried many of the listed kernels in the update section but none seem to change anything.

Fog Version 1.2.0

I’m new to v1.2. I’ve been using .29 for a very long time and it finally gave out on me so I only updated withing the last month. I’ve successfully imaged many computers though already so I’m not sure where to look

Thanks for the help!

[george1421]

First welcome to the FOG forums.

Second what OS is on this 3040?

I see you are npb file reference it sounds like this system is in uefi mode. What do you have configured for dhcp options 67?

FOG 1.2.0 stable is a bit old, you may need to (sneak in) the trunk kernels to support newer hardware. Your issue is not with the kernels yet, but iPXE.

You can get the latest kernels from these links (4.6.2 i think).
https://fogproject.org/kernels/bzImage
https://fogproject.org/kernels/bzImage32

Just download these file and then move them to /var/www/html/fog/service/ipxe on the fog server. Just rename the original ones first then move these files into that location. These kernels will fix the network issue you will have once you can get the kernel to boot (past your current iPXE issue).

[JMacavali]

Currently they are loaded with Win7, but they are fresh from the factory (though refurbished).

For option 67 I have undionly.kpxe

Is there something I need to do to get the computer out of uefi mode? The bios was different (newer) than any I’ve seen before and I couldn’t quite navigate around like I used to.

[adukes40]

@JMacavali I believe you just disable secure boot, and make sure you choose to use Legacy ROMs. We do that on anything newer than a OptiPlex 790 (I believe) in our environment, I have 5040’s and We do not use UEFI anything yet.

[JMacavali]

Well, much better. Thank you so far.

Now it’s stuck at “attempting to send inventory”

Any ideas on that?

[JMacavali]

Success!!

I had to actually go back and use kernel 4.10 for it to work. The newest kernel didn’t allow it to register but 4.10 did. It’s imaging now so hopefully it loads up.

Thanks for all the help!!!

[george1421]

@JMacavali Right, with undionly.kpxe you need to have the device in bios mode.

Now you are at the other point I mentioned. The kernels you have do not have the drivers for the NIC in the 3040. You need to manually install the trunk kernels.

[george1421]

@JMacavali said in Dell 3040:

Success!!

I had to actually go back and use kernel 4.10 for it to work. The newest kernel didn’t allow it to register but 4.10 did. It’s imaging now so hopefully it loads up.

Thanks for all the help!!!

?? I guess if it worked. That is very strange indeed.

[JMacavali]

@george1421 Well, seems to be. Maybe it will hang during imaging but it’s going well so far. I’ll come back if things break again.

Thank you for your help

[JMacavali]

@george1421 Ok, so what happened here is that I was also having the same issue on a laptop (Latitude 3450). I was doing all the configuration changes using that instead of the desktop (i forgot I posted about the desktop first). That’s my fault, I’m sorry.

Can you explain how to install the trunk kernels or what that means?

[george1421]

@JMacavali In my first post (very bottom of this thread) tells you where to download them from and where to place them.

If you have 4.1 working then run with it. I was more concerned that you had 4.6.2 installed and not working and you downgraded to 4.1 and it worked. That is strange if that is the case.

[JMacavali]

4.1 is working on the Latitude 3450 laptops.

It is not working on the 3040 desktops. So 4.6 will work with the 3040?

If so, then I’ll leave the kernel at 4.1 until I’m done with the eight 3450 laptops that I need to image, then change it to 4.6 for the 3040 desktops.

Once again, thank you for your help.

[george1421]

@JMacavali said in Dell 3040:

4.1 is working on the Latitude 3450 laptops.

It is not working on the 3040 desktops. So 4.6 will work with the 3040?

If so, then I’ll leave the kernel at 4.1 until I’m done with the eight 3450 laptops that I need to image, then change it to 4.6 for the 3040 desktops.

Once again, thank you for your help.

Well that is what is troubling 4.6 should work for the both. But you can have two kernels installed on the fog server, just name the 4.6 kernels to something like bzImage46 and then for the 3040 you can define a custom kernel (in the host record for each 3040) to load the bzImage46 (or just wait until you have the one model done and then move the bzImage over).

For the developers, I think they would want to understand why 4.1 works and 4.6.2 fails. You shouldn’t have to mess with kernel version (IMO).

[JMacavali]

So here’s where I’m at.

1 3450 laptop imaged using the 4.1 kernel version. The rest say ‘no boot device’ - which is what I’m assuming is expected.

Now when I change the kernel to 4.6.2 both - the 3450 laptops & the 3040 desktops say ‘unable to register host for the following reasons’ (and doesn’t list a reason) and then just sits a a black screen trying to register it.

I’m going on vacation and will be gone for a week, but I’ll be back to this thread after that. Thanks for the help so far, hopefully there will be an easy fix for why it won’t register when I get back.

[george1421]

@JMacavali We if you pxe boot and then select the PXE menu option for compatibility. It would be interesting to see what fails using the newest kernels. But enjoy your holiday and come back to the thread when you are well rested.

[JMacavali]

Hi again. I’m back and ready to try this all again.

Here’s where I’m at:

I’m working on 2 different computer types (which I know isn’t a good thing but they are having similar problems).

Dell Latitude 3450:
Using the newest kernal - 4.6.2 and it starts to go through fog, but when it gets to the part where it would actually image, it just gives me a black screen with a cursor blinking at the bottom. This also happens using 4.5.3. However, the computer does register with fog.

Dell Optiplex 3040:
Using the newest kernel - 4.6.2 and it won’t even register the host with fog. Says ‘host unable to register for the following reasons’ and then just goes to a black screen with nothing else (doesn’t list any reasons). Same thing happens on 4.5.3.

I’ve tried other kernel versions as well and none of them seemed to matter. At this point, I don’t know what to do. If anyone has a suggestion, I’m all ears. Thanks for your help so far with all of this!

[JMacavali]

I did the Compatibility test:

Dell 3450 - Network - Fail / Disk - Pass

Dell 3040 - Network - Fail / Disk - Pass

Both computers showed the 4.6.2 kernel that I downloaded when they started the compatibility test.

[george1421]

@JMacavali This is just a wild guess. Can you place a dumb (unmanaged) switch between these devices and the building network switch, then try the compatibility test again?

We have see issues where spanning tree is enabled on the building switch, but none of the fast STP modes are enabled (port fast, RSTP, etc). The default spanning tree time to forward is 27 seconds. This means that the port will not forward traffic for 27 seconds after the link light comes on. During the FOG booting process the link light winks 3 times, and since the FOS engine (the OS that captures and deploys images) is so fast, it has already given up by the time the switch port starts forwarding data. I’m not saying this is the case but the quick test is to just put a dumb switch between the target and the building switch to see if you get different results.

[JMacavali]

The fog server and the devices are located on the same dumb switch. The dumb switch is connected to the network drop in my office (which comes from the core switches).

Thank you for offering the advice but that doesn’t seem to be the problem here.

Just to confirm I’ve unhooked everything and tried a different dumb switch. Still says network test failed.

[george1421]

@JMacavali Ok that was the easy test.

The next step is to schedule a debug deploy (don’t worry we are not going to deploy anything). You will need to manually register the device, then setup a deploy job. Don’t forget to check the debug option on the deploy task. Then pxe boot the target. It should load the FOS engine and require you to press enter at the wall of text a few times. But in the end it should drop you to a command prompt.

At the command prompt key in and post here

1. ip addr show Make sure the link light is on the target computer
2. lspci -m this will spew a bunch of text but it contains the necessary info to identify the hardware in that computer.

Lastly if you have one of these target computers booting into windows, it would be interesting to know the vendor and hardware ids for this NIC. These NICs should be supported by the FOS engine (linux kernel). We just need to verify which bits are falling down.