FOG will not boot - "Failed to get an IP via DHCP!

[Wirefall]

@Wayne-Workman The full specs for the MintBox can be found here - http://www.fit-pc.com/web/products/mintbox/mintbox-mini/

Max Screen Resolution 1920 x 1200 @ 60Hz
Processor AMD A Series
RAM 4 GB SO-DIMM DDR3
Hard Drive 64 GB
Graphics Coprocessor Radeon
Card Description dedicated
Wireless Type 802.11bgn
Number of USB 2.0 Ports 3
Other Technical Details
Brand Name MintBox
Series MintBox Mini
Item model number FITLET-GB-C64-D4-M64S-W-XL-BMint
Hardware Platform PC
Operating System linux
Item Weight 8.8 ounces
Product Dimensions 4.2 x 3.3 x 0.9 inches
Item Dimensions L x W x H 4.25 x 3.27 x 0.94 inches
Color Green
Processor Brand AMD
Computer Memory Type DDR3 SDRAM
Hard Drive Interface Solid State
Audio-out Ports (#) 1
Power Source DC
Voltage 12 volts

[george1421]

@Wirefall From within the FOG debug console (the same place where you entered the ifconfig -a command key in lspci -nn|grep etwork

We will be interested in a line that looks like this

00:19.0 Ethernet controller [0200]: Intel Corporation 82579LM Gigabit Network Connection [8086:1502] (rev 04)

More precisely the hex numbers (i.e. [8086:1502] ) in the square brackets. Those numbers identifies the nic controller.

[Tom Elliott]

Just a simple question, seeing as you state the device id information is 8086:1539 (which has been in the linux kernels for a very long time), does your registration issues happen on multiple systems of the same model or just this one system? I only ask because this isn’t seeming to make sense. The only things I can think of:

1. Device is having issues (Unlikely seeing as tftp and ipxe appears to work properly).
2. Device patch cable is screwed up? (Likely because TFTP doesn’t require the cabling layout as full network support typically does, – confusing because while TFTP might work, iPXE shouldn’t).

[Wirefall]

@george1421 [8086:1539]

[Wirefall]

@Tom-Elliott This does occur on both of the two test boxes I have.

To rule out flaky hardware/cables, I’ve taken the following steps.

1. Swapped smart switch for unmanaged switch.
2. Replaced all cables.
3. Replaced NIC on FOG server - both are Intel Gigabit, [8086:10ce] and [8086:10d3]

Thanks and Happy New Year!

[Wirefall]

@Tom-Elliott @george1421

I’ve eliminated the possibility of the problem being the infrastructure or of it being PXE server specific.

1. I PXE booted my netbook within the test environment and everything worked as would be expected.

2. I booted the server off of a clonezilla live CD and attempted to PXE boot one of the mintboxes from that. I received the clonezilla menu, but selecting an imaging option failed on bringing up the Ethernet device “If this fails, maybe the ethernet card is not supported by the kernel 4.7.0-1-amd64”. So, basically the same thing I’m seeing from FOG.

Definitely odd as these machines come pre-configured with Linux Mint and I’ve installed Kali (debian-based distro) on four of them without a single networking issue.

If anyone has any other ideas I’m definitely willing to try them. I’d rather not have to go with another hardware platform if I don’t have to. Luckily still in dev, though.

Thanks for all your help! Cheers

[Sebastian Roth]

@Wirefall Great you posted the full kernel messages listing. At first I didn’t notice any issue but looking closer I found the issue:

igb: probe of 0000:01:00.0 failed with error -2

The PCI ID perfectly matches the one you mentioned in your fist post. Didn’t take long to find several reports on this issue that came in just lately:
https://lkml.org/lkml/2016/11/24/172
https://bugzilla.suse.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1009911
https://patchwork.ozlabs.org/patch/700615/

Some say that it might possibly work if you disable PXE boot for this NIC in BIOS. I don’t think this is a great solution as FOG heavily relies on PXE booting the clients. Let’s hope that this will be fixed in the latest kernel fairly soon!

[george1421]

@Sebastian-Roth Is there any chance that an older kernel will work here? I’m going to assume that both Mint and Kali are using older kernels that do work (which may not be a solid test since @Wirefall is not pxe booting either OS platforms).

[Tom Elliott]

@Sebastian-Roth It’s funny you mention the idea that the kernel is the problem (I didn’t notice the error message until you pointed it out). My Next question was to ask about using older kernels.

[Tom Elliott]

Alright,

I’ve rebuilt the 4.9.0 kernels to have the patch in the first link.

Please goto FOG Configuration Page->Kernel Update

Download the 4.9.0 kernels as bzImage/bzImage32.

The one with Arch Type (x86_64) would be named bzImage
The one with Arch Type (x86) would be named bzImage32

[Wirefall]

@Tom-Elliott Woo-hoo, capturing an image now!

A big thank you to everyone who helped track down and fix this. Your support is amazing! Looks like I have another FOSS project to add to my contribution list…