Ghostcast session keeps timing out ???

[jamin100]

Hi guys,

Right, I have 30 new PC's (all identical) that i have dotted around the school which now need imaging. I have installed all our software onto a one of the machines, sysprep'd it and imaged it with Symantec ghost (version 11)

Now, I thought that before i deployed the image out to all the required machines, i'd test a couple first just to make sure everything was ok.

So i have got 3 machines in 1 classroom all connected to the network via the same patch panel and switch.

I start a ghost cast session on all 3 machines and deploy the image. I use multicast for this session.

Machine 1 - works fine. Image has copied over no problems
Machine 2 & 3 have failed. They are reporting that the session has timed out.

So i try again exactly the same with the 2 machines and the same thing happens again. They connect to the session fine for a few minutes copy 400-500MB of data across then suddenly time out.

Ok, So i try the session on the clients indivadualy thinking that maybe the data is getting swamped over the network and not getting through. Same result.. Times out.

Next i try doing a unicast session on both machines. Machine 2 Fails and times out but machine 3 complete's fine without any problems.

So I try the same procedure on Machine 2.. Again it times out. Finally i try Direct Broadcast on machine 2 and yet again it times out.

So for some reason I'm getting some strange problems when ghosting over the network. I have performed quite a few ghost sessions on this network in the past and this is the first problem i am having.

Here's what i have figured out so far.

1. All clients are picking the correct IP addresses and the ghost cast sessions start fine and data does start copying onto the machines.
2. All clients are in the same subnet
3. All clients are connected to the network via the same gigabit switch and the same patch panel.
4. I have tried the machines in different network sockets .. Same problem..
5. The Image is stored on the server hard drive and not a USB drive attached to the server.

The network is a vanilla Windows 2003. With a dual core Xeon processor and 2GB RAM. I performed the images at 3:45 when there were only 5 machines turned on and using the network for minimal work (ie they were all using word)

Does anyone have any idea?

Thanks
Ben

[linkazoid]

I'm having the same problems as you describe... are you using Ghost Solution suite 2 by any chance?

I think it may be to a recent update....

if you find a solution then please post it here... i will do likewise.


Mike

[jamin100]

No, I don't think im using solution suite 2...
Just Symantec Ghost 11.

I havn't done any software updates on ghost anyway so unless it does it automatically ????

But yeh if i find a solution in the meantime i will post i back here....

Thanks
Ben

EDIT... Just some more info... It seems to keep failing at the same point. On the bottom of the client it reads "Restoring... remaining NTFS MFT files.". The computer then hangs and i have to hold the power button down to restart the PC

[DMcCoy]

Dead drive? Thats normally the issue when ghost repeately dies while imaging

[jamin100]

I wouldnt have thought so. The drives are brand new as the machines are... I'll try a few other machines over the network tomorrow and see what happens.

The machines did boot to the pre installed XP before i tried to ghost them

[linkazoid]

EDIT... Just some more info... It seems to keep failing at the same point. On the bottom of the client it reads "Restoring... remaining NTFS MFT files.". The computer then hangs and i have to hold the power button down to restart the PC

This is the same for me... but only when i'm creating the image file.. it always stops at about 450Mb.. this was when i was using the automated client method with Ghost Solution Suite.. used the boot cd and created the session manually and it worked fine..

[eejit]

I *think* that Ghost 11 and Solution Suite 2 are the same thing. (and we've had problems with it too - went back to 8 and everything worked fine (if you have the switches for SATA drives))

[jamin100]

I'm using a universal Packet Driver CD from ghost 8.3 that i have used before on many other machines with no problems...

Going to make a new bootable CD now and see if that makes a difference.

[jamin100]

OK, that didnt work either... The connection has timed out again after transmitting 741MB to 1 client....

The only thing different about these desktops is that they have SATA drives.
But i imaged some 30 laptops about 3 weeks ago with sata drives and had no problems with those.

EDIT:
I have now tried connecting one of the new PC's to the core switch (same as the server) and still have the same problem.
This is really starting to F*** me off.

[Sirbendy]

We had some funky issues with Ghostcast 11 and Ghost 8.x about 12 months ago...same sort of thing. IIRC, it was switch config. As a bypass while waiting for LEA to get round to a solution I set up a linux SME server on a spare box hosting the image, and used the "Universal MS Network boot disk" to boot and map the machines to that..that worked fine over mapped drives.

It's all been resolved now though..

[krisd32]

Could be something to do with the spanning tree protocol on your switches? have a look on your switches to see if its enabled.

[jamin100]

Its not the switches. I think i MAY and i mean MAY have solved the problem which i think was to do with a IRQ conflict between two of the devices.

I'm ghosting a machine now to see how it reacts but its taking ages. All other machines that i ghost usually take about 10-15 minutes. This is taking about 45 minutes over a multicast session.

As soon as it finishes or fails i'll let you know.

[broc]

We have had similar problems caused by down-level NDIS2 network drivers.

[jamin100]

Yeh, I've downloaded the NDIS drivers for the NIC in these machines and it seems to be going ok but really slow! Its a 1GB network allover and the highest speed its reached is 160MB/s

But at least its working.

Anyone know why its slow? I'm only imaging 1 machine which is connected to the same switch as the server. I've tried both unicast and multicast.

[DMcCoy]

Yeh, I've downloaded the NDIS drivers for the NIC in these machines and it seems to be going ok but really slow! Its a 1GB network allover and the highest speed its reached is 160MB/s

But at least its working.

Anyone know why its slow? I'm only imaging 1 machine which is connected to the same switch as the server. I've tried both unicast and multicast.

Is it a broadcom NIC?