Boot Dell XPS 12 to USB to Network card

[Psycholiquid]

@george1421 OK so I used a dell with EFI and I can see where the onboard NIC is working but the USB to Network never shows. This leads me to believe it is the USB NIC. I tried the same thing with docking station and I get the same results. I am thinking I need to find a USB NIC that will work with EFI. Any suggestions?

[george1421]

@Psycholiquid I’m out of the office today, so I can’t give feedback on the one and only usb ethernet adapter I have. I will do that tomorrow.

But my google-fu found this post which talks about the XPS 13 and usb booting. No definitive answer here either other that to use an older usb ethernet adapter. http://support.plugable.com/plugable/topics/can_i_use_a_usb_network_adapter_for_boot_time_pxe_scenarios

This post does confirm some of my suspicions about why this isn’t working.

[edit] found reference to StarTech USB21000S2 working still trying to confirm [edit]
[edit2] I’m finding more references to the above startech usb working at least in bios mode. The other thing I found interesting is that usb2 ports (black) work more successfully than usb3 ports (blue). [edit2]
[edit3] I did find this article that gives pretty good background inforamtion. http://www.johnwillis.com/2014/03/pxe-booting-using-usb-to-ethernet-dongle.html I do have a usb 2 adapter in my office, when I’m back tomorrow I will confirm for sure if it works with uefi mode on a dell laptop [edit3]

[Psycholiquid]

@george1421 Yeah I did some googling to on chip-sets of NIC and found the mot basic one gonna order it and see how it does: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00484IEJS/ref=cm_cd_asin_lnk

[Wayne Workman]

@Psycholiquid said:

I am thinking I need to find a USB NIC that will work with EFI. Any suggestions?

https://wiki.fogproject.org/wiki/index.php?title=WorkingDevices#USB_Ethernet_Adapters

[Psycholiquid]

@Wayne-Workman Good call. Do we know if the chipset in that one has been tested?

http://www.amazon.com/Sabrent-Ethernet-Chromebook-Specific-USB-G1000/dp/B000XFVZ5G

OR

http://www.amazon.com/Support-AX88772-UtechSmart-Ethernet-Chromebook/dp/B00CBD2X5E

I’m thinking the latter will be fine but was hoping for the first one.

[Wayne Workman]

@Psycholiquid as cheap as they are, I’d say order them both. That cost is trivial to most I.T. departments.

Once you have one that works, you might want to order a few of them. Only more and more devices will come without wired Ethernet adapters.

Generally, Realtek chips work real well with Linux. Atheros is another great chip maker.

Here are some with realtek chips:

http://www.amazon.com/CableCreation-Gigabit-Ethernet-software-required/dp/B013G4C8RE/ref=sr_1_2?s=pc&ie=UTF8&qid=1453312172&sr=1-2&keywords=realtek+usb+to+ethernet

http://www.amazon.com/Plugable-Gigabit-Ethernet-Network-Chromebook/dp/B003VSTDFG/ref=sr_1_5?s=pc&ie=UTF8&qid=1453312172&sr=1-5&keywords=realtek+usb+to+ethernet

http://www.amazon.com/F-Dorla-Ethernet-Chromebook-Specific-USB-G1000/dp/B013W5J3CA/ref=sr_1_12?s=pc&ie=UTF8&qid=1453312172&sr=1-12&keywords=realtek+usb+to+ethernet

[Psycholiquid]

@Wayne-Workman Great minds my friend I ordered 1 of each.

[george1421]

@Psycholiquid Great, when you have a working system, if you wouldn’t mind document what was done so we can create a wiki page.

You are pioneering a new process that will help others too. You are just the first to get there with the need and the skills to solve it.

[Psycholiquid]

@george1421 I most definitely will.

[Psycholiquid]

OK I was able to get two USB to Network dongles. I have tested with the Dell XPS 12 with no luck. I have tried the following:

taking the following files and booting to them each by renaming to bootx64.efi

intel.efi
realtek.efi
ipxe.efi
snponly.efi

The two devices are the following:

ASIX AX88178 Chipset USB-G1000
ASIX AX88772 chipset

Neither are showing up. I am at a loss here, is there a way to make a pxe.efi file with eh drivers in it. Like custom make one?

Basically I am looking for a bootable USB drive with drivers for USB to Network drivers. That will talk back to the FOG server to get it started. Just a down dirty one will work.

[Psycholiquid]

Also tried it with the Surface. No dice there either.

[Psycholiquid]

However I am getting this from the Surface using the docking station:

So after that screen it just sits there and eventually goes into Windows 10. This is a Surface 4 so I guess we are partially there.

[Wayne Workman]

@Psycholiquid said:

OK I was able to get two USB to Network dongles. I have tested with the Dell XPS 12 with no luck. I have tried the following:

taking the following files and booting to them each by renaming to bootx64.efi

intel.efi
realtek.efi
ipxe.efi
snponly.efi

The two devices are the following:

ASIX AX88178 Chipset USB-G1000
ASIX AX88772 chipset

Neither are showing up. I am at a loss here, is there a way to make a pxe.efi file with eh drivers in it. Like custom make one?

Basically I am looking for a bootable USB drive with drivers for USB to Network drivers. That will talk back to the FOG server to get it started. Just a down dirty one will work.

Can you take a photo of what you’re seeing?

[george1421]

Looking at your original post again. I see you were following the hard way instructions and you are booting into bios mode. Do you have a usb 2.0 network adapter to try? Also ensure that you are plugging the usb 2.0 ethernet adapter into a usb 2.0 (black) port not a usb 3.0 (blue) port. The hard way should boot. I just booted the FOG Client debug kernel from the flash drive and I was able to pull an IP address with a sabrent usb adapter #USB-G1000. I’ll create a boot flash drive and see if I can boot in bios mode into the fog menu.

[edit] Wait, you mentioned the harder way, that is for uefi booting not bios booting. For Bios booting you can use these instructions: https://forums.fogproject.org/topic/6347/usb-boot-bios-client-into-fog-menu [/edit]

[Sebastian Roth]

The latest picture you posted shows an UEFI network boot screen I think. But it says: “NBP filename is undionly.kpxe”. This is a BIOS boot file and won’t work in UEFI netboot.

We have another thread with someone trying to PXE boot a Surface Pro 4 device and we haven’t succeeded yet as far as I know. Those devices will definitely cause some head aces in the next months I guess. From what we have tested so far it seams like our kernel is fine booting on those (using grub on a USB stick) but the hand off from iPXE might be an issue. I am still trying to get my head around on how to debug this any further.

[Tom Elliott]

@Sebastian-Roth maybe debug efi,bzImage on ipxe clauses?

[Psycholiquid]

@Wayne-Workman Same as before in the video I posted, getting nothing at all.

@george1421 Both adapters are USB 2.0 and ports are USB 2.0. I am going to try to create the efi file form that website you had posted again today to see if the file makes a difference. I was using the files from the FOG server this go around. I only have the option to UEFI boot in these devices. The Surface gives me a PXE boot but it isn’t using BIOS it is emulating it from what I am gathering. But I will get on that more once I get the Dell issue ironed out.

@Sebastian-Roth I’m not sure what you are saying, should I use a bootable USB like I do with the Dell and it will pick up form there? I will try that today and see what I get. Those things are a pain to get into the UEFI interface. they love to just rebooting into Windows even when you know how to hit the button correctly. LOL

@Tom-Elliott I will try all the above suggestions and report back my findings. Hopefully I can carve out some time today to try all this. My boss is the only one with a Surface I can test on and he forgot it at home. I will be sending him out to retrieve it. Meh bosses, so undependable.

[Psycholiquid]

@george1421 OK I just recreated the ipxe.efi file and migrated it to the flash drive and renamed. It is working, but the Sabrent USB-G1000 is still not being seen by the flash boot process. I have tried the following:

Plugged directly into the USB port on the side of the Dell XPS 12

Connected the Dell docking station and plugged both the flash drive and the USB network into the docking station (Which still seed the flash drive fine and boots from it, but never sees the USB dongle)

I am doing all this using the UEFI boot process form the dell. Hitting F12 and choosing to boot from the flash drive. I am thinking I am missing something here but I am not sure what it might be.

I have changed the settings in the UEFI to UEFI with Legacy OPROM; Secure Boot: OFF per the instructions of the Dell forums, but so far no dice. Is this the same process you are using?

Here is a screenshot (Have I mentioned I hate Dell yet?)

[george1421]

ok lets make sure I’m in the right thread.

You created a usb flash drive using the tutorial with the harder way. When you boot from that drive with the usb ethernet adapter installed do you get to the fog menu. What we did here was install the ipxe.efi boot kernel onto the usb drive and we are booting off that. This takes the place if the efi network booting that does not exist in some devices. (noted o790, e6420, e6430). Once you get to the FOG menu, when you select an option (like register) the FOG Client kernel is transferred to the client and the that takes over. Neither of these processes will fix efi network booting from this device.

[Wayne Workman]

Random thought… try updating the firmware.