problems Loading Windows iso in advanced menu.

Wayne Workman

@sacha-marin This might help: http://ipxe.org/howto/winpe

I’ve been intending to document how to do it for FOG specifically, but just haven’t done it yet.

sacha marin

@Wayne-Workman i think this is the way i was going to use, boot into winpe AND then load the sysprep image, since windows just wont load either way.

Wayne Workman

@sacha-marin well, this method doesn’t need 8GB of ram… it doesn’t load an ISO into memory, it just loads files. That’s the benefit of starting the Win7 installation via WinPE rather than an ISO. Not to mention probably significantly faster loading speed.

sacha marin

i managed to do pretty much all i wanted , except loading linux based iso, i always get that error
Unable to find a medium life file server.

Anyway i will document the best way to do the windows 7 this week. maybe i can make a wiki article on it or something.

sacha marin

Solution to install Windows 7 from the Fog server advanced menu “Did not tested win 8 and 10 as of now.”

Booting from windows"s iso directly simply wont work for reason unknown to me. You need to boot on a winpe iso

Take it here : http://ipxe.org/howto/winpe You need to get the WAIK from windows.

Your code line should be like that.

:winpe
initrd http://${fog-ip}/fog/iso/winpe.iso	
chain memdisk iso raw
goto MENU

After you booted on the winpe the only thing you will have is a command line utility. For the next step to work you will need a windows share on the network or a samba server. I use a windows share from my server. You must use the net use command to specify what you want to do next, aka boot the windows 7"s setup.exe

  net use \\myserver\installers
  \\myserver\installers\win7\setup.exe```
Of course you have to adjust this to your server.

if your server has authentication then it will be asked. Just enter your password and username like this, username@domain Press enter and then the password

after that if everyone work you should be promted to the windows 7 install !
**
TLDR : Boot from winpe with “chain memdisk iso raw”
run the command to start the setup.exe from your windows share.
install windows.**
NO YOU CANNOT DIRECTLY RUN A WINDOWS ISO FROM THE ADVANCED MENU.

PROTIP : you can modify your winpe.iso to boot directly to a batch file with a menu, to choose which iso you want, and make it totally codeless. i will post the code for example in the next post.

ps: sory for pour engrish.

sacha marin

@sacha-marin

To boot directly to a menu batch file you have to follow the instruction here : http://ipxe.org/howto/winpe article : Customising Windows PE

tldr : mount the boot.wim in command line with imagex, add your code, unmount it, use Winiso to open it and change the old boot.wim to the new and save it, boot on it and a menu will appear, you also have to manually create the folder from the command. Im talking about the temp folder and the folder in it.

here is the code for my menu.

wpeinit
@echo off

:MENU
ECHO.
ECHO ...............................................
ECHO Its dangerous to go alone, take these windows                                                
ECHO ...............................................
ECHO.
ECHO 1 - Windows 7 English
ECHO 2 - Windows 7 French
ECHO 3 - Windows xp english
ECHO 4 - Free donuts.
ECHO 5 - EXIT
ECHO.



SET /P M=Type 1, 2, 3, or 4 then press ENTER:
IF %M%==1 GOTO winen
IF %M%==2 GOTO winfr
IF %M%==3 GOTO winxpen
IF %M%==4 GOTO donut
IF %M%==5 GOTO EOF




:winen
net use w: \\mtl-nt-apps\apps\iso\winpe\win7eng /user:username@domain password
\\mtl-nt-apps\apps\iso\winpe\win7eng\setup.exe
GOTO MENU


:winfr
net use w: \\mtl-nt-apps\apps\iso\winpe\win7fr /user:username@domain password
\\mtl-nt-apps\apps\iso\winpe\win7fr\setup.exe
GOTO MENU

:winxpen
net use w: \\mtl-nt-apps\apps\iso\winpe\winxpen /user:sacham@paradox qwerqwer1
\\mtl-nt-apps\apps\iso\winpe\winxpen\setup.exe
GOTO MENU


:donut


echo              _ _,---._ 
echo           ,-','       `-.___ 
echo          /-;'               `._ 
echo         /\/          ._   _,'o \ 
echo        ( /\       _,--'\,','"`. ) 
echo         ^|\      ,'o     \'    //\ 
echo         ^|      \        /   ,--'""`-. 
echo         :       \_    _/ ,-'         `-._ 
echo          \        `--'  /                ) 
echo           `.  \`._    ,'     ________,',' 
echo             .--`     ,'  ,--` __\___,;' 
echo              \`.,-- ,' ,`_)--'  /`.,' 
echo               \^( ;  ^| ^| )      ^(`-/ 
echo                 `--'^| ^|^)       ^|-/ 
echo                   ^| ^| ^|        ^| ^| 
echo                   ^| ^| ^|,.,-.   ^| ^|_ 
echo                   ^| `./ /   )---`  ) 
echo                  _^|  /    ,',   ,-' 
echo                 ,'^|_(    /-^<._,' ^|--, 
echo                 ^|    `--'---.     \/ \ 
echo                 ^|          / \    /\  \ 
echo               ,-^---._     ^|  \  /  \  \ 
echo            ,-'        \----'   \/    \--`. 
echo           /            \              \   \ 
echo			HMMM DONUTS.
GOTO MENU

Windows xp is not working and homer is funny but useless.

ps: winen is win7english and winfr is for the french version

Sebastian Roth

Great work, thanks for testing and reporting it here!

Wayne Workman

@sacha-marin I’ll be working on converting this to a WiKi article in the future. Excellent work, Bravo!

sacha marin

@Wayne-Workman Noice. Tell me if you need more info. im not the best at documenting.

Rayco

Hi, I have the same problem, but not in all computers.

Some computers work fine, and load WinPE correctly.

But others computers loaded at 100% iso file, and did a self restart.

Someone with a idea ?

I cheked cables and switches too.

george1421

@Rayco I have a tutorial for loading the winpe iso image, let me link it in here.

https://forums.fogproject.org/topic/6284/booting-mdt-2013-litetouch-with-fog

The other thing you need to be aware of with your winpe image is that you have all of the winpe hardware drivers embedded into the iso image or some systems may fail to boot. You also need to be mindful of the bios (firmware) settings to ensure they are the same between the winpe booting devices.

Rayco

@george1421 Thank you for ur fast answer.

All computers have bios updated and WinPE’s has drivers incluided.

I got a screenshot with the trouble. I think we have a problem with a trunked image when go to mapped in memory. (But not all computers fails, several do it nice)

alt text

Maybe we have a problem with image or drivers?

Thank you a lot.

george1421

@Rayco This is an interesting puzzle.

The system boots one some and not other systems.
You are using the same WinPE image for all
I assume you’ve confirmed that the iso image on the FOG server is exactly the same as in your windows environment by using md5sum utility in both environments and compared signatures??

Do you have 2 computers of the same model where 1 works and 1 doesn’t?
If so have you compared the firmware settings?
Are these systems all uefi or bios (legacy) format?
Are the systems with error in one geographic network location?
Any other times you can think of where we could draw a conclusion?

On a side note (not related to your problem) you can eliminate the pause at the bottom of the boot (as in your picture) by removing a file from your iso image. If you remove /boot/bootfix.bin the iso image will boot without the pause of “Press any key to boot from CD or DVD…”

Rayco

@george1421 Thanks for your interest.

We have one WinPE for each Laptop model. In some models work fine, in other not, but in one cd bootable work fine in all.
Each one has his own WinPE, some models use the same WinPE.
Yes, they have the same size in bytes.
When one model work fine, work fine in all of the same model.
We think the problem is on some hardwares configurations.

I will test your suggestion of remove bootfix.bin.

Tom Elliott

@Rayco If One model is broken, does all of the same model also fail? (Or multiples of the same model more accurately.)

Rayco

@Tom-Elliott

If one model fail, all of this models fails too. But if burned in to bootable cd, work fine.

Thank you a lot.

Tom Elliott

@Rayco I don’t know how you created the menu, but maybe this can help:
http://ipxe.org/howto/winpe

Quazz

@Rayco Can you share the PXE boot commands you have?

Rayco

@Quazz

 initrd http://${fog-ip}/fog/service/ipxe/iso/asus/TOOL_NB64_W10GPT_V1.3.3.iso
 chain memdisk iso raw ||
 goto MENU

This is a config menu.

@Tom-Elliott
If some computers work well, I must think that those that do not work is by the configuration of ipxe?

I will check it, in few hours I answer you.

george1421

@Rayco said in problems Loading Windows iso in advanced menu.:

initrd http://${fog-ip}/fog/service/ipxe/iso/asus/TOOL_NB64_W10GPT_V1.3.3.iso

Not specifically related to your issue, but I wouldn’t place your files in the FOG package path if you want your files to survive an update. I would recommend you move the iso director to a root level directory on your fog server. i.e. http://${fog-ip}/fog/service/ipxe/iso -> http://${fog-ip}/iso

problems Loading Windows iso in advanced menu.

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