Booting WinPE from Advanced Menu

[CrazyPenguin37]

I have been researching this topic a lot and I still keep having this issue where my WinPE.iso will not boot. I have it (and the memdisk) stored in an easy access location, all have proper ownership and permissions, but still states that there is no file or directory when I try to boot it.
(ex. menu)
:WinPE
initrd http://10.101.xx.x/ISO/WinPE.iso
chain memdisk iso raw

I have tried to use the ipxe/winpe help website that is often included in the forums, but it still has not helped me resolve my issue. Can anyone lead me in the right direction to get this to work? Thanks.

[LordRaptor333]

I am having the same exact issue right now also. I have become so frustrated that I actually have built my own WinPE PXE boot server and if I can’t resolve this, I may just have to retire the fog and just move on to doing everything through my PXE server using just .wim files. I really like the user friendliness of fog, but I could always just automate everything with the WinPE iso. Please help solve this because I don’t want to give up on fog.

[Tom Elliott]

@CrazyPenguin37 can you provide a screenshot of what is/isn’t happening?

[Tom Elliott]

Also what are the links you see referenced? I just did a quick search for ipxe and from the looks of it you need to extract the iso and call it’s files.

[Tom Elliott]

And you both followed this? http://ipxe.org/howto/winpe

[george1421]

https://forums.fogproject.org/topic/6284/booting-mdt-2013-litetouch-with-fog
Method #1 is for booting the winpe iso image
Method #2 (down a little in the post) is the process for booting the .wim file

Its been a while since I wrote this KB, but the mdt generated iso image IS a WinPE environment. How are you building your winPE iso image? Understand the instructions from the above link are for setting up the mdt iso using the trunk version of FOG but the concepts are the same if you are managing the iPXE menus by hand. But if you look how I’m doing in method 1 is how you have it setup in your OP.

Have you burned that iso image to an actual CDROM (or usb drive) and tried to boot the iso that way to see if it actually works.

Just to be sure that something hasn’t changed in FOG I’ll test booting my mdt winpe iso image in the morning.

As Tom posting what part isn’t working with the boot? A screen shot of the error might help narrow in on a solution.

[Quazz]

Where exactly on the server is your ISO stored? The full path would be helpful.

[george1421]

I can confirm that I can pxe boot a mdt (Win10 PE) iso image following my instructions from the tutorial.

I placed the iso files in /var/www/html/iso and that made the parameters block look like this:

initrd http://192.168.1.88/iso/LiteTouchPE_x86.iso
chain memdisk iso raw

I did this on a freshly built FOG server so there was no left over magical foo from last time I tested it.

You have to be very aware of case because to unix (linux) case IS important!!

[george1421]

@LordRaptor333 said in Booting WinPE from Advanced Menu:

I am having the same exact issue right now also. I have become so frustrated that I actually have built my own WinPE PXE boot server and if I can’t resolve this, I may just have to retire the fog and just move on to doing everything through my PXE server using just .wim files. I really like the user friendliness of fog, but I could always just automate everything with the WinPE iso. Please help solve this because I don’t want to give up on fog.

To be totally fair here, this is not a FOG problem. What you are doing is not the primary (or even secondary focus) of the FOG Project. I understand your frustration because I’ve tried to make open source systems do things it was not designed to do too. Some times I’ve been successful but most of the time it was a waste of effort. But I can tell you that it is possible to boot both winpe by both the .wim file and the .iso image via the trunk version of 1.2.0 of fog. It does work.

If you are willing to open your own thread, we are willing to help you get it worked out, but you have to remember that what you are doing is not the focus of the FOG project.

[Junkhacker]

the biggest problem people seem to have with WinPE iso booting is remembering that the url you enter into the menu is case sensitive. have you verified the exact link?

[LordRaptor333]

Awesome help george 1421!!! That was my issue all along was that I was not using the /var/www/html/iso, but I was pointing directly to just /iso. It all makes sense now. Thanks for all the help!!! WinPE is successfully booting for me!!! Great work FOG and thank you for the advanced menu!!!