[wds] PXE-E11: ARP timeout

[cttech]

Hi All,

 

I'm getting this error PXE-E11: ARP timeout only when I'm trying to WDS on one type of machine a Acer Veriton Z280G. But sometimes it will give the options to press F12 but most times I get the error. I've got a fresh install of Windows Server 2008 with just WDS running on it and DHCP is running on a seperate Windows Server 2008 DC.

 

I've looked on the web but couldn't find anything that fixes my problem hope some one can help me.

 

Thanks

Jon

[Geoff]

This might be a switch issue, if the switch takes a while to sort out the link speed detection/STP and what not the PXE boot might time out. Try forcing the link speed on the switch and/or disabling STP.

 

Also check for BIOS updates if this is an embedded motherboard NIC, vendor BIOS PXE stacks are often buggy and exhibit this sort of problem.

[sparkeh]

What make of switch are you going through.

I have read a fair bit about certain Cisco switches causing this and needing a settings tweak.

[SYNACK]

Upgrade the BIOS and if avalible the network card firmware on the machines, had a batch of hps that did this too until updated. PXE just kept crashing out.

 

As others have said you could also look at other causes like incorrectly configured STP on the switches, I would not turn it off but rather to client switchport mode or portfast / whatever your switch vendor calls it if it is in play.

 

Remember if they get too annoying and you are using MDT as well you can tell it to build a boot CD iso that will get you around this issue also.

Edited March 2, 2010 by SYNACK

[armadillo]

Hi, slightly different from above posts but similar problem. I have bought a few Dell Optiplex 780s and tried to ghost them and they keep failing. They PXE boot fine and after I get the ghost screen where I have to enter the session ID it fails loading the image. Usually when I ghost similar machines such as Dell Optiplex 760s I only need to change the hard disk mode in the BIOS and it works fine after that. But not these new Optiplex 780s I treid all hard disk modes in the BIOS and I had no success.

 

Any help and advice is much appreciated.

Thanks

[Ryan]

Jon, did you ever get this resolved? I'm having the exact same problem when imaging (or trying to) with WDS/MDT.

 

It was fine yesterday afternoon, and now i want to boot to PXE and capture my sysprepped image, i'm getting the ARP timeout error.

 

Same laptop, same cable, same floor port, same switch, same switch port.

 

Any ideas?

[diggory]

Had a PXE boot problem with some old ASUS laptops I wanted to FOG. The only way I could get round the buggy PXE boot rom was to use a PXE boot CD.

Try this web site for a handy ISO:

start - Etherboot/gPXE Wiki

 

It might rule out if the PXE rom is an issue.

[Ryan]

I sorted this by popping the following into a command prompt on the WDS server:

 

WDSUTIL /Delete-AutoAddDevices /DeviceType:ApprovedDevices

 

It flushes out previously known PCs - apparently WDS doesn't like to re-image the same machine multiple times. Understandable, but a pain in the boobs when you're testing.