[mdt] PXE Boot Issue

[daveyboy]

We have exactly the same issue here (using SLES / OES 11 / ZenWorks 11 PXE boot) and this is the only type of PC that does it.

We are just starting to look at why and what we can do to fix it. We have about 150 Clevo L390T's (Previous model) that are rock solid !

 

We have also found it is the only type that drops the network connection (randomly) when imaging. We have Dlink switches, which we are looking at, we are also looking into changing the NIC settings (within windows / on our imaging OS). Like you, we cant seem to find an updated BIOS - so we'll just carry on until we find a fix or they run EOF.

[CraigM]

I had one PC like this in my school. Asus motherboard with an Attansic/Atheros on board NIC. Thing flat out refused to PXE boot, despite going through all the right motions. No updated BIOS on Asus' site, and I couldn't find much info on the NIC itself. An interesting thing I noticed is that neither the port on the HP 2610 switch or on the NIC lit up until Windows was almost fully loaded. Every other NIC or PC I used on that port worked fine.

 

If you remember Winmodems, it seemed like something similar to me - hardware doesn't initialise properly until it's in Windows. In the end I found an Intel NIC laying around which I put into the machine. What do you know, booted first time, every time.

 

Out of curiosity, what is the brand of NIC labelled when it's running in Windows? Realtek, Broadcom, Intel, Atheros?