@sebastian-roth & @george1421
Ok… The netgear switch didn’t change anything. I’m starting to suspect the problem is in the server FOG is running on. I’ve got a meeting with HPE next week. I’ve been pinging them about this and the tech keeps telling me that there is nothing wrong with the server, however, I tried to boot the server to the corporate PXE and I couldn’t get it to even get the PXE menu. Whereas with the FOG server, I could get the PXE Menu with no problem. I will let everyone know the outcome of my meeting with HPE and we can pick it up from there.

I noticed that when I ran ifconfig on the server after booting to a Knoppix Live CD, The only adapters that were detected were the add-in cards. It registered them as a Broadcom NIC. So my assumption (I’m sure I don’t have to explain what assume means) is that the netXen nic is the LOM and the Broadcom is the PCIe. So Knoppix is registering eth0 as the Broadcom. I booted to the OS (Winblows) and it shows the LOM as the primary NICs.

By the way. Thanks to the both of you for your help.

@george1421 I’ll know something tomorrow with the dumb switch. It’s an old netgear sitting in a drawer.

@Sebastian-Roth Here’s the latest data for you.

03:00.0 Ethernet controller [0200]: Broadcom Corporation Device [14e4:1657] (rev 01)
03:00.1 Ethernet controller [0200]: Broadcom Corporation Device [14e4:1657] (rev 01)
03:00.2 Ethernet controller [0200]: Broadcom Corporation Device [14e4:1657] (rev 01)
03:00.3 Ethernet controller [0200]: Broadcom Corporation Device [14e4:1657] (rev 01)
0a:00.0 Ethernet controller [0200]: NetXen Incorporated NX3031 Multifunction 1/10-Gigabit Server Adapter [4040:0100] (rev 42)
0a:00.1 Ethernet controller [0200]: NetXen Incorporated NX3031 Multifunction 1/10-Gigabit Server Adapter [4040:0100] (rev 42)
0a:00.2 Ethernet controller [0200]: NetXen Incorporated NX3031 Multifunction 1/10-Gigabit Server Adapter [4040:0100] (rev 42)
0a:00.3 Ethernet controller [0200]: NetXen Incorporated NX3031 Multifunction 1/10-Gigabit Server Adapter [4040:0100] (rev 42)

Let me know what else you need.

@sebastian-roth with regard to the switch, I’m still trying to locate a non-managed switch. According to the network team, the switch I’m using has been wiped (although I suspect something is still enabled on it). I don’t have the password for it so I can’t log in and verify spanning tree. I have a small 4 port switch at home and will try it tomorrow.

For the ID’s, I hate KVM switches when they aren’t labeled properly. I was looking at the FOG server instead of the server I’ve been trying to image. This is what I show;

$ lspci -vv |grep -e "^[0-9]" -e "Kernel driver" |grep -A 1 "net"
03:00.0 Ethernet controller: Broadcom Corporation Device 1657 (rev 01)
03:00.1 Ethernet controller: Broadcom Corporation Device 1657 (rev 01)
03:00.2 Ethernet controller: Broadcom Corporation Device 1657 (rev 01)
03:00.3 Ethernet controller: Broadcom Corporation Device 1657 (rev 01)
0a:00.0 Ethernet controller: NetXen Incorporated NX3031 Multifunction 1/10-Gigabit Server Adapter (rev 42)
               Kernel driver in use: netXen_nic
0a:00.1 Ethernet controller: NetXen Incorporated NX3031 Multifunction 1/10-Gigabit Server Adapter (rev 42)
               Kernel driver in use: netXen_nic
0a:00.2 Ethernet controller: NetXen Incorporated NX3031 Multifunction 1/10-Gigabit Server Adapter (rev 42)
               Kernel driver in use: netXen_nic
0a:00.3 Ethernet controller: NetXen Incorporated NX3031 Multifunction 1/10-Gigabit Server Adapter (rev 42)
               Kernel driver in use: netXen_nic

@sebastian-roth Those are the onboard nic’s. I had to pull the PCIe card for another server. If I have the card in the system, I can boot to the LOM, but they don’t recognize that there is a DHCP responding. The PCIe NIC will respond to the DHCP, but won’t PXE boot.
I’m not finding anything specific about the NetXtreme, are they supported for imaging?

@george1421 Just scrolling through all of the responses. I’ll run through your steps here shortly and get back to you.

@sebastian-roth Sorry for the delay in getting back, I only work Monday through Thursday. Booting to a live CD and pulling the NIC list gives me the following

02:00.0 Ethernet controller: Broadcom Corporation NetXtreme II BCM5709 Gigabit Ethernet (rev 20)
Kernel Driver in use: bnx2
02:00.1 Ethernet controller: Broadcom Corporation NetXtreme II BCM5709 Gigabit Ethernet (rev 20)
Kernel Driver in use: bnx2
03:00.0 Ethernet controller: Broadcom Corporation NetXtreme II BCM5709 Gigabit Ethernet (rev 20)
Kernel Driver in use: bnx2
03:00.1 Ethernet controller: Broadcom Corporation NetXtreme II BCM5709 Gigabit Ethernet (rev 20)
Kernel Driver in use: bnx2

@george1421 - I’m not sure about the drivers. So here’s what I did. With the addon card connected to the switch and the LOM connected to the switch, I was able to register and inventory the server with no problem. However, FOS records the addon card as the primary mac address. The server won’t PXE to the addon card, even thought it’s listed in the boot order, it only wants to use the embedded. Don’t know why only the onboard, must be some connection problem between the server and the chair.
I connected the cable back to the LOM port 1 and the system booted to PXE fine. However, unless I change the primary MAC in FOS to match the embeded, then it will report that the system has not been registered or inventoried. So if I create a task to push an image to the server, it doesn’t recognize it and never starts.
Changing the MAC in FOS and everything works correctly. But then I’m back the original problem, I’ve got to install and addin card into the server just to get it to image. Might as well pop in the winblows DVD and install it that way.

@george1421 - Ok… The Dell server does the exact same thing. I did find something interesting however. For this Dell, there are two onboard NICs and a PCIe NIC. I initially plugged a cable into eth0 and got nothing. A added a cable to eth1 and still got nothing. The system would attempt to get an IP and then fail. However, when I added a cable to the PCIe card, the system inventoried. I then added a card to one of the HP servers and was able to get it to inventory. So… the embedded NIC is good for PXE, but bad for getting a DHCP and the PCIe is good for getting a DHCP, but bad for PXE?

While this is a viable workaround, I won’t have the time to pop in an add in card to every system just to get it to image? I did notice that both of the servers are running NetXtreme II NICs onboard. Is there something with that manufacturer that doesn’t work with isc-dhcp?

@george1421 said in Failed to get an IP via DHCP!:

@george1421 sorry to keep sending you back to the well, but is FOG_WEB_ROOT set to /fog/?

The other fields I was mentioned are FOG_TFTP_HOST and FOG_WEB_HOST

Don’t worry about that. Yes, both are set to the IP address and FOG_WEB_ROOT is set to /fog/.

@george1421 That is the target system. I’ve tried other servers to see if they will image, but they are all HP and they all do the same thing. I’ve got a old Dell I brought up to test to see if the problem is isolated to one manufacture or to the FOG.