Netbooting Windows

[carrie]

Is it possible to create & deploy a diskless netboot image of a windows volume (NTFS or FAT32).

I would like to be able to boot an XP image from a server, in order to use Symantec Ghost for imaging dual-boot intel macs. I have created a Windows live CD (using Bart PE), including Ghost, which I used to successfully create and deploy a dual-boot image (using -ir switch).

So far I have been able to:
- Create an image of a NTFS windows volume with NetRestore Helper 3.3.2
- Restore an image of a NTFS windows volume with NetRestore 3.3.2
- Create a NetInstall set of a NTFS windows volume with NetRestore Helper 3.3.2
- Create a .dmg image of a Windows partition using Disk Utility
- Create a netboot image of a windows partition using System Image Utility
- Create a .dmg image of a windows live (Bart PE) CD
- Create a netboot image of a windows live (Bart PE) CD

However, I have not yet been able to netboot any Windows image successfully. In the Netboot settings in Server Admin, the NetInstall images created using NetRestore Helper display as Intel architecture (cannot boot diskless). The Netboot images created using System Image Utility display as PowerPC architecture. I can enable the image on the Server, but the client intel mac will not netboot the windows image. It works fine with OS X images.

I am using using two intel Macbooks to test dual-boot deployment solutions, one of which is running Mac OS X Server 10.4.8.

I have searched the usual forums, but have not been able to find any solutions.

Any advice, help or ideas will be much appreciated!

[end15]

I noticed you had mentioned that you got Bart PE to work on the MacBooks. I'm trying to do the same but have not been able to install the network drivers, and I'm also unable to see the Mac hard drive. Do you know of solutions to either of these issues?

Thanks,
endxv

[carrie]

I followed advice from these website to make a ghost CD for imaging intel macs:
http://www.samspublishing.com/articles/article.asp?p=519943&seqNum=6&rl=1
http://blog.case.edu/djc6/2005/08/28/automated_bartpe_ghost_cd_installer


1. Download Bart PE from http://www.nu2.nu/pebuilder/ to any windows PC
2. Extract pebuilder3110a.zip to C:\PEBuilder
3. Run pebuilder.exe to configure boot disk
4. Under source, select your CD drive (with a Win XP SP2 CD inserted)
5. Under media output, choose whether you would like to create an .iso or burn directly to a CD
6. Copy the following ghost files to C:\PEBuilder\plugin\ghost8 - Ghost32.exe, Ghostexp.exe, Ghostsrv.exe, Ghostcdr.dll
7. Under Plugins, enable Symantec Ghost 8.0 plugin
8. Copy the network drivers for your mac hardware into C:\PEBuilder\drivers\Net – for MacBook use yk51x86. This can be found in C:\WINDOWS\system32\DRIVERS\yk51x86.sys (after installing mac drivers in XP), or downloaded from the internet.
9. All other default settings are okay
10. To make Symantec Ghost run in forensic mode (-ir) on startup, add the following to the end of the penetcfg.ini file located at C:\PEBuilder\plugin\penetcfg:

[PostNetAutoRun]
; StartupFlag = CommandLine

; StartupFlag is a bit field that can take the following values:
; 0 = run hidden and wait (00 00 00 00)
; 1 = run normal and wait (00 00 00 01)
; 2 = run hidden and don't wait (00 00 00 10)
; 3 = run normal and don't wait (00 00 00 11)

1 = %SystemDrive%\programs\ghost8\ghost32 –ir


Hope this helps :)

[chrisp]

See this other thread here:
http://forum.onmac.net/showthread.php?t=1754

I don't have much hard info to back up my claims. My opinion is that while EFI netbooting is based on PXE, it is designed to load EFI binaries, not BIOS-based boot code. So you'll have to find some workaround.