Trouble with booting to windows
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So i got a job to set up fog for a classroom… the people who were supposed to help me don’t know how to solve the issue i have which is that no matter which bios exit type i use the pc is unable to boot into windows from the fog menu.
I just loop in the fog menu, get a chainloading error or get stuck in the rEFInd menu depending on which option i choose.
I haven’t used software like this before and so have no idea on how i should be looking to fix this…
What are the first steps i should take to troubleshoot this?
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The first thing is to just start with one computer.
Understand what mode that computer is running in (bios or uefi).
From there I would go into the FOG Configuration->FOG Settings->FOG Boot Settings menu.
Configure:
EFI BOOT EXIT TYPE: REFIND_EFI
BOOT EXIT TYPE: SANBOOTSave the settings.
Next pxe boot the computer into the fog menu. The default menu item is “Boot from hard disk” after the timeout that first computer should exit to the hard drive using one of the 2 methods you configured. If the computer is bios based it should call SANBOOT to locate the boot partition. If the computer is uefi based it should call rEFInd to locate the boot partition.
If it doesn’t then we’ll need to see a screen shot of the error to understand what is not going right.
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@george1421 The computers are running on bios. I did the changes above but selecting the boot from hard disk only gets me to the rEFInd about screen. Going back to the rEFInd main menu there are only options for about, shut down, reboot and reboot with system utility
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@JerJer OK if the computers are in bios mode you should NOT see refind since that is for uefi.
There are global exit modes which I gave you instructions for in the previous posts, but you can only define host specific exit modes that override the global settings. If you are still getting refind then look at the host definition exit mode for that single computer in question. Bios needs SANBOOT and UEFI need REFIND.
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@george1421 I don’t exactly understand what you mean but these are the settings im using currently
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@JerJer OK in your second picture.
Set host bios exit type to SANBOOT
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@george1421 Still goes into refind
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@JerJer well lets take a different approach.
From a browser key in the following url, but replace the IP address of your fog server.
http://<fog_server_ip>/fog/service/ipxe/boot.php?mac=00:00:00:00:00This is going to print out the fog iPXE menu.
Look down the page after the menu items
item fog.local Boot from hard disk item fog.memtest Run Memtest86+ item fog.reginput Perform Full Host Registration and Inventory item fog.reg Quick Registration and Inventory item fog.deployimage Deploy Image item fog.multijoin Join Multicast Session item fog.sysinfo Client System Information (Compatibility) choose --default fog.local --timeout 5000 target && goto ${target} :fog.local sanboot --no-describe --drive 0x80 || goto MENUFor the
:fog.localmenu item, does it say sanboot like above?Do the same test but replace the mac address of
00:00:00:00:00with the mac address of the target computer you are testing with. -
same with both macs
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@JerJer Well then this is interesting. How is refind even in the picture here? if you search the entire iPXE menu using “find” in the browser is refind even mentioned?
Is the target computer using refind as some kind of boot manager, like in a dual boot configuration (windows and ubuntu)?
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@george1421
Can’t find refind on the page. The pcs only have windows but i have no idea if they have refind installed and how i would go about checking thatEDIT: oh and the no such device or address on every host shouldnt affect this? they still wake up and do all the fog stuff
EDIT2: heading off for the night gonna continue trying to solve this tomorrow if you come up with more ideas and i have time to try them
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@JerJer I’m about out of ideas here. refind should not be sent by the fog server if its not in the iPXE menu.
I guess one way to tell if its coming form fog would be to rename refind on the fog server to something else as a test.
In
/var/www/html/fog/service/ipxedirectory you should find refind.efi. Rename that withmv refind.efi refind.efi.savThen pxe boot the target computer again. You might see a chain loading error, but that will tell us if refind is coming from FOG.no such device or address on every host
That depends on where you are seeing this error message.
I think we should see screen shots of the screens you are seeing. Refind as well as error screens to see if we can get the context of the error.
Oh, and I forgot to ask, what version of FOG are you using?
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@george1421 FOG version is 1.5.5
errors in the list all hosts screen.
will send pics of the refind screen in a bit.
Can’t seem to find the file /var/www… FOG was installed for me on the server but i don’t know how… will have to ask if they remember -
@JerJer Ah that’s fog’s ping command.
You need:
- The hosts to be able to be resolved by name by DNS
- The host have udp port 445 open in the windows firewall.
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@JerJer My initial reaction is that isn’t fog’s refind. I don’t know of a way to confirm, but FOG’s version of refind should be 0.11.0 to 0.11.4.
Wait I have a fog build environment, let me check that version.
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@JerJer What version of FOG are you running?
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@george1421 sry hopped off the pc but the version is 1.5.5
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@george1421 did you find anything out about refind?
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@JerJer Well… I found in the git hub notes that 0.9.1 was in the build release for quite a while. I have not contacted one of the developers to find out what is currently shipping.
I would then revert to my previous request to temporarily rename refind.efi and then go through the pxe boot process and exit to the hard drive. I have not ever heard of refind being sent to a bios based computer before, especially since its not listed in the iPXE menu. I don’t understand how its getting to the target computer.
