ghost PXE

[RabbieBurns]

Can anyone point me to, or give me a rundown of step by step instructions of how I might get some laptops to boot from PXE into Ghost, rather than me having to have boot CD/USB for ghosting?

 

Cheers.

[InspireICT]

I would be very interested in this too - would save a lot of time with usb drives.

[sted]

ive just got a wds boot image that contains the ghost exe files created using winbuilder www.boot-land.net

[Dageezah]

You need to first install a PXE boot server - 3Com PXE server is as good as any, a TFTP server, then using ghost create a multi driver disk and load it into your TFTP server.

 

Not sure the rules here about sending you the software, but if you start with that I am sure I can help you out once you get the client booting to PXE.

 

On the other hand though, WDS seems to be the way forward. We deploy all our windows this way now and works every time, although I did like Ghost Enterprise when I was using that, it would re-image and join the demain and everything for you.

[InspireICT]

I found the following post on edugeek and it works - after a bit of fiddling.

 

This is the first draft from notepad for those insterested. I'll tidy it up later and check the steps again.

 

Ghost PXE boot without a full RIS server

 

Most of this is from PXE Setup without RIS on Windows 2000 Server

 

There are a couple of minor but important changes required to get ghost to work.

 

You need Ghost Solution Suite, a Windows 2003 dhcp server. I assume this can be done on multiple dhcp servers if you have them, and also details modified for subnets but I've not tried it yet.

 

This section prepares DHCP

 

Open DHCP management

 

1) Right click on DHCP server and select "Set Predefined Options"

2) Click "Add". Use the following details.

 

Name: ClassID

Datatype: String

Code: 60

Description: ClassID

 

Click "ok" and "ok" again.

 

4) Right Click "server Options". Select "Configure Options"

 

Tick option 013 and enter 0x19

 

Tick option 043 and enter 01 04 00 00 00 00 ff (you might have to delete the first 00 characters)

 

Tick option 060 and enter PXEClient for its string value

 

Tick option 066 and enter the name of the server, for example "server.domain.local"

 

Tick option 067 and enter the name of the bootfile, in ghosts case, its "boot\ghost.ldr". More on this later.

 

 

 

 

5) Right click on the DHCP server and select "All Tasks -> Restart" (Note on 2003 SP2 I got an error from the MMC console - the service actually restarted sucessfully and reloading the MMC fixed it)

 

 

You should now be able to get a DHCP address from a PXE client machine - if not check the

 

 

This section configures TFTP to server the ghost boot files

 

1) Copy tftpd.exe from c:\Windows\System32\dllcache to c:\Windows\System32 (dll cache is a system folder, use the command prompt to copy or turn on protected operating system files in view options briefly)

 

2) Download the Resource kit tools from here:

You can install these on any machine to keep the server tidy - you only need instsrv.exe

 

3) Copy the srvinst.exe from the resource kit to c:\windows\System32

 

4) Run the cmd prompt

 

Run the command "instsrv TFTPD c:\windows\system32\tftpd.exe

 

It should report that the service was sucessfully added.

 

5) Save the following text as ghost.reg

 

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

 

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\TFTPD\Parameters]

"Directory"="C:\\Program Files\\Ghost"

 

 

 

6) Right click the ghost.reg and choose "Merge"

 

7) Open "Services" from Administrative tools and change the TFTPD service to automatic and then start it.

 

 

Now we create the ghost boot image and its loader.

This bit is all trial and error by me

 

1) Install Ghost and its utilities on the Ghost server (can be done on a workstation, but you need the export the TFTP reg keys and merge them on the workstation temporarily).

 

2) Create a C:\Program Files\Ghost folder

 

3) Create The following folder structure (Yes, the Images\Images is correct)

 

c:\Program Files\Ghost

c:\Program Files\Ghost\boot

c:\Program Files\Ghost\OSChooser

c:\Program Files\Ghost\OSChooser\i386

c:\Program Files\Ghost\Setup

c:\Program Files\Ghost\Setup\Images

c:\Program Files\Ghost\Setup\Images\Images

 

4) Create the following files (they are empty, the names a checked by the boot wizard)

c:\Program Files\Ghost\OSChooser\i386\startrom.com

c:\Program Files\Ghost\OSChooser\i386\ntldr

 

5) Now run the "Ghost Boot Wizard", you should have a Microsoft RIS option now.

 

6) Run the RIS option from the boot wizard

 

7) I use the following options:

Universal Packet Driver

DHCP

Ghost for the name (doesn't matter there will be no menu)

 

This should create a Ghost folder in the Images directory created earlier

 

8) Copy the ghost.ldr from C:\Program Files\Ghost\Setup\Images\Images\ghost\i386\templates to c:\Program Files\Ghost\boot\

 

9) Copy the ghost.dsk from C:\Program Files\Ghost\Setup\Images\Images\ghost\i386\templates to c:\Program Files\Ghost\boot\

[DMcCoy]

Some of that no longer works as it's based on 2003 server.

 

Recently I have created Ghost as another menu item to choose from the WDS image list. I used this article Enterprise Support - Symantec Corp. - How to build a Windows PE [Vista] CD/DVD that contains Ghost32.exe and then join a client machine to a Ghost Cast Server session to create or restore an image file. to create a WDS compatible boot image with ghost on it.

[InspireICT]

I got it working on a 2008 R2 Server today with minimal complications - had to change the himem.sys on the boot image for one from a WinME bootdisk.

[InspireICT]

Some of that no longer works as it's based on 2003 server.

 

Recently I have created Ghost as another menu item to choose from the WDS image list. I used this article Enterprise Support - Symantec Corp. - How to build a Windows PE [Vista] CD/DVD that contains Ghost32.exe and then join a client machine to a Ghost Cast Server session to create or restore an image file. to create a WDS compatible boot image with ghost on it.

 

I will give that a try aswell - although the PE takes quite a bit longer to load up.