Urgent Help....Diskless Booting

[Shaikh Mohsin]

Hi friens,
I am working on disklless booting, i have 3 PC, 1 with windows server 2003 with all role installed, 2nd with RHEL-5, 3rd PC does not have any HDD,CD,FDD only have 256 RAM & LAN card, now i have to boot that diskless PC with server 2003 through LAN what i have to do now , i have done some config but i think it is sufficient, plz any help regarding this. plz guid me about how to procede.

thanks.

[jbennet]

Is it the original version of server 2008 or is it R2?

If its the original, use RIS, else use WDS

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc766320%28WS.10%29.aspx

[MrV]

Hi friens,
I am working on disklless booting, i have 3 PC, 1 with windows server 2003 with all role installed, 2nd with RHEL-5, 3rd PC does not have any HDD,CD,FDD only have 256 RAM & LAN card, now i have to boot that diskless PC with server 2003 through LAN what i have to do now , i have done some config but i think it is sufficient, plz any help regarding this. plz guid me about how to procede.

thanks.

It depends what OS you want to boot on your diskless PC.
If Windows, you need certainly a 3rd party software like HP Image Manager.

If Linux, there are many solutions, just google the following terms
Linux Diskless Boot
http://www.google.fr/search?q=linux+diskless+boot&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official

[Shaikh Mohsin]

Thanks alot
i will try.

[MrV]

Is it the original version of server 2008 or is it R2?

If its the original, use RIS, else use WDS

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc766320%28WS.10%29.aspx

Using RIS or WDS means that you have to install some HDD in the client in order to deploy the OS "locally".
I understood that there would not be any HDD in the client, but I might be wrong...

[jbennet]

Oh right, well just configure your DHCP server for PXE/TFTP - remember to configure the DHCP paramater for boot server so they can query and recieve the IP for the TFTP server. In the MMC window for the DHCP server there is a folder for boot images.

[MrV]

Oh right, well just configure your DHCP server for PXE/TFTP - remember to configure the DHCP paramater for boot server so they can query and recieve the IP for the TFTP server. In the MMC window for the DHCP server there is a folder for boot images.

Well not exactly, at least on Win2003 (that Shaikh Mohsin is using), there is no real folder for boot image, it's the TFTP "root" folder that contains boot images, but theyr are just "Network Boot Programs), nothing that is a complete OS per se.

You CAN'T make a boot image of Win2K/XP/VistaWin7 like that, you need a third party bootloader (Network Boot Program) and a third party "remote disk" driver and a 3rd party remote disk server...

Take a look à HP Image Manager, it has all what is needed:

https://h20392.www2.hp.com/portal/printable/swdepot/try.do?productNumber=IMTRIAL

Theres a 90 days/20 clients evaluation version !

Take care and... read the f... manual !

[jbennet]

You CAN'T make a boot image of Win2K/XP/VistaWin7 like that, you need a third party bootloader (Network Boot Program) and a third party "remote disk" driver and a 3rd party remote disk server...

Ive seen it done with Windows Embedded, but it makes sense that the full versions cant do it.

[Shaikh Mohsin]

Hi friends as both of u said i have tried all that thing, its work but when i am try to open WDS legacy it gives an message this utility can only run in WDS server that is yet not configure or its running in legacy or mixed mode. how to get out of this...& one thing more while booting client its boot and after some time it gives an message that a matching network card driver not found in this image...what to do now...for your info i am using VMware workstation trail.

thanku....

[jbennet]

What functional level is your domain running on? Win2k/2k3? (native mode) or NT4? (mixed mode). Look it up under domains and trusts under admin tools on the DC.

[MrV]

Ive seen it done with Windows Embedded, but it makes sense that the full versions cant do it.

Windows XP embedded remote boot uses a...
RAMDISK !
It loads the content of the RAMDISK via TFTP and then boot off it.

Needless to say that you need quite a bit of RAM (and remember that address space is limited to 4GB in WinXP, whether embedded or pro).

[MrV]

Hi friends as both of u said i have tried all that thing, its work but when i am try to open WDS legacy it gives an message this utility can only run in WDS server that is yet not configure or its running in legacy or mixed mode. how to get out of this...& one thing more while booting client its boot and after some time it gives an message that a matching network card driver not found in this image...what to do now...for your info i am using VMware workstation trail.

thanku....

If you want to use WDS or RIS to DEPLOY an OS to your client I can't help.
I know better true diskless booting: having a computer that is NEVER operated with any hard disk drive or flash-disk or local storage of any kind.

Now, if what you want to do is to install a Windows OS on a VMWare guest VM, why don't you mount a CD-Rom/DVD-Rom drive and boot your VM off that CD/DVD drive?
It will run the installation program and install Windows OS on the virtual disk drive you allocated to your VM. Note that with VMWare you can use a .iso image as if it was a CD/DVD drive.

Unless what you want to do is to learn how to operate computers that do not have any CD/DVD drives and that can't use a USB CD/DVD drive

Rgds

[Shaikh Mohsin]

OK jbennet its 2k3 sp2(legacy).....but i also want to ask u that what i am trying to do is.. client do not have any HDD ok while booting its get booted with server & installation start on the client HDD....i want that installation should b on server only & only one time & many client can b connect...its just like client should use all services of server from booting to use of OS & etc...plz if u getting what i am trying to say then plz help me.....i want some thing like this
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VGfXHatjXbM

plz help Thank u

[Shaikh Mohsin]

Thanks MrV what i Exactly want to say plz see my last reply in this thread...i am testing in VMware & want to implement in small home network.

thank u.

[MrV]

you need an 3rd party software.
Try the link I sent and please, READ THE MANUAL !

[Shaikh Mohsin]

Ok thanks a lot both of u, its work as u said...but its nice with 3rd party software but i want to do without using the 3rd party software....if is it possible plz help me....can we do by using linux.....which one will better RHEL5 or Ubuntu 9.04 Server Edition.

[jbennet]

You can have diskless rehdat clients, but system-config-netboot is broken in RHEL 5. On ubuntu you could use LTSP (i know that using that its possible to have diskless edubuntu clients)

[MrV]

With Linux there are plenty of solutions.
google for
diskless linux how-to
http://www.google.fr/search?q=diskless+linux+howto&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t
The most common way is to use PXELinux and NFS root techniques.
But if you are not already well experimented in PXE/DHCP/Linux/kernel config, you will have to learn, learn, make errors, post questions in appropriate forums, learn again...

Ltsp (Linux Terminal Server Project) is nice but if you want your application to run on your diskless PC (and not on a Linux Server which you would just got some display onb your diskless PC), you might as well use directly a pure diskless PC technique like PXELinux + NFS-root

Take care and good luck !

[Shaikh Mohsin]

hello friends,
After 3 days continuously working on diskless booting now from linux, i got nothing......i have tryed LTSP,DRBL etc on dif disro ubuntu 9.04 & fedora 11 as well but of no result...the result i can show u is that the machine in my vmvare which i have set to network boot he doesn't get IP address from linux distro....when i try with win 2003 server it gets.....what going wrong with me....i have some how to's and some pdf after seeing & doing it is not happeng...how to proceed from now.
plz help.....

thank u all

[MrV]

First things first

Do you have a DHCP service running in your linux server ? It should send an IP configuration to your client.

You should READ a lot about DHCP, PXE, TFTP, BOOTP...

I warned you, it will take time to achieve, it's not a double-click operation, there are several things to set up (and thus to understand).

Don't try to do too fast and try to find ONE how-to that seems to work and that you seem to understand and stick to it.

I can't help much with Linux remote boot but I can tell you that DRBL is not what I would try first!!!

Try PXELinux instead. AT first, try to set your linux server to serve PXELinux to your diskless client. It will be your first step.

HTH

[Shaikh Mohsin]

Hello Friends

I am very thank full to u MrV & jbennet finally its done it is booting through PXE from ubuntu server....but it is in text form.....something like this

(initramfs).......................................................................................................etc etc
'help' for more commands

have i done write or wrong ?...is it the proper way....

is it posible to get GUI mode ?.....plz help

[MrV]

GUI is possible, for sure. Make sure you passed the initramfs stage and that you could switch to multi-user mode.
Then you have to have a window manager etc.

[Shaikh Mohsin]

Hello MrV can u plz explain me in more detail about GUI plz i have reached till initramfs command promt......
......& now after rebooting my linux server its not responding after issuing IP address to client and stop at TFTP......before its working fine what to do for this is any saving option.....to save all the config & setting....etc

[MrV]

I can't help you more, you have to dig a little and follow the PXELinux howtos step by step carefully
Good luck