Ghost Woes with Dell Latitude ST Tablet

[RabbieBurns]

We have taken delivery of 100 Dell Latitude ST Tablets. We have ordered some of the docking stations to make use of the Ethernet port so we can image them but Im having a real problem trying to Ghost them, or even use any WinPE to boot.

 

The docking stations use the SMSC LAN7500 USB-LAN Chip, The driver on the dell site works fine for installing directly into windows, but I cannot seem to find a driver I can use with WinPE either via PXE or Ghost USB stick that will work. OR PC-dos, etc.

 

This is the data sheet for the usb-lan chip but Im struggling to find any drivers...

 

http://www.smsc.com/media/Downloads_...heets/7500.pdf

 

Any help at all would be much appreciated!

 

Cheers

Edited January 19, 2012 by RabbieBurns
added full name of device to Title of thread

[FN-GM]

Your link doesnt work

 

I dont think ghost supports USB type network ports. I have had the same with some Vye tablets. Can you PXE boot the tablet?

 

You could try this, i have used this lots it nearly has every DOS driver - http://netbootdisk.com/

Edited January 19, 2012 by FN-GM

[RabbieBurns]

Oops.

 

http://www.smsc.com/media/Downloads_Public/Data_Sheets/7500.pdf is the datasheet of the chipset, SMSC - LAN7500 - Hi-Speed USB 2.0 to 10/100/1000 Gigabit Ethernet Controller has some more information...

 

Trying to WinPE it gets a blue screen error with the error message that the bios is not ACPI compliant..

 

These things are so new that theres nowt on the net anywehre I can find

[mac_shinobi]

There is one bios update but that only relates to improving system performance using VTS ( as per the description ) on the enhancements etc. Will subscribe to this and have a look at work.. There is a download link on the smsc site and will also download dells version of the driver to see what they have done different in the inf file, if anything

[RabbieBurns]

The download link on the smsc site requires a partner login account.

 

I have already tried to use their tech support form to send them a request so hopefully will hear back from them at some point.

 

Open to other suggestions of how to image these en-masse.

[Arthur]

I cannot seem to find a driver I can use with WinPE

For Windows PE v3.0/v3.1, you should use the Latitude ST Windows 7 Driver CAB. However, it doesn't appear to include a driver for the USB/LAN chip.

 

It might be worth trying the drivers above plus the SMSC driver you downloaded previously for Windows 7?

Edited January 19, 2012 by Arthur

[RabbieBurns]

Cant get any winPE working with ghost at all but I think Ive got it working with WDS so Ill just need to give myself a crash course of how to use that and do it that way.

[AngryTechnician]

Which driver did you use in the end to get WDS working? I've been unsuccessful so far too.

[RabbieBurns]

THe one from the Dell website from arthurs link, R317737_ZPE.exe file name. Extracted the files, and then added them to Drivers, and then added them to the boot image.

 

I have literally never used WDS before I am stumbling blindly.

 

I have got it booting, and I have just deployed a vanilla win7 install to it over ethernet so im chuffed I got that bit working..

 

Just need to figure out how I can use this to capture an image from a tablet Ive preinstalled all the stuff on, and then redeploy that image. If anyone can tell me how to do that in a nutshell Ill be happy

[RabbieBurns]

Ok I think Ive figured out capture now, although I dont have a machine I have sysprepped to test with. Im going home now its 8pm and Ive not worked 12 hours in a long time!

[AngryTechnician]

Hmm, that's the one I'm using, but I think I may have more intrinsic problems. PxE never even gets any further than downloading the WDSNBP file and repeats that step about 5 times...

 

 

(Click to zoom)

 

Architecture: x86
Contacting Server: 192.168.3.6.
TFTP Download: \boot\x86\wdsnbp.com
Downloaded WSDNBP...

Press any key to cancel network boot service

 

Then it will sart spitting out the following error over and over for about 3 minutes...

 

EHCI Ctrl Xfer ERROR: USB_URB_STATUS_ERROR!

 

...before eventually stopping at:

 

Failed to restart TFTP.
TFTP download failed.

 

Some of the time it doesn't even get this far, claiming there is no network link (same port and network cable will PxE boot other machines just fine though). Starting to wonder if I've got a dodgy dock.

Edited January 19, 2012 by AngryTechnician

[RabbieBurns]

I bought 20 of the docks, only testing with 2 of them but they both seem fine.

 

TBH tihs is my first dabble with WDS and PXE booting I normally just use Ghost and boot the laptops from USB or CD and do them 15 at a time.

 

I just added the .wim from the win7 dvd to the Boot Images, Added the drivers to the drivers section, and then added the drivers from there to the Boot image. Mine is booting a different file from yours though not sure if that makes any difference?

 

\boot\x86\images\winpe.wim is what mine loads..

[AngryTechnician]

According to Walkthrough: Deploy an Image by using PXE, the loading of wdsnbp.com is an earlier step in the boot process, before it gets to winpe.wim. So mine is failing before I get as far as anything with drivers in it.

 

Bugger.

[Arthur]

Not sure if it helps, but you can add WiFi support to Windows PE quite easily...

 

Unified Windows PE builder script for WAIK, with Wi-Fi support

[RabbieBurns]

Ive got them booting with windows WAIK ok via pxe now, problem is I have no idea how to use this to deploy images.

 

I cannot seem to get the SMSC drivers to load into the ghost WinPE, which is what we normally do use for imaging (by booting via WinpE or PCDos on USB)

[AngryTechnician]

Not sure if it helps, but you can add WiFi support to Windows PE quite easily...

 

Unified Windows PE builder script for WAIK, with Wi-Fi support

 

If only we had a wireless network.

[AngryTechnician]

Just checking back in to report that my problems with WDS on the Latitude ST pretty much went away after upgrading from BIOS version A01 to A04, despite none of the newer BIOS versions having any PXE fixes listed.

[RabbieBurns]

Im not sure what bios ours are on. Is A04 a new release?

[AngryTechnician]

Released 17/05/2012: Dell System BIOS A04

 

Curiously, the driver page for ours only lists A03, but when you click on that, the newer A04 is listed under 'Other versions'.

[RabbieBurns]

cheers ill get them to install it next week.

 

we are still having major issues with our slates, hopefully this will fix up some of them

[AngryTechnician]

I'm not terribly impressed with ours - to be honest I think the ST was a bit of a misstep by Dell. I won't be buying any more of them, and I hope they've learned some lessons when it comes to designing Windows 8 slates in the near future.

[RabbieBurns]

we only bought ours as a pilot scheme and also to jump onto the tablet bandwagon.

 

IVe given a USB with todays windows 8 preview release to be installed onto them but will see how it goes. I couldnt get the consumer install to work when trying the windows 7 drivers for it so hoefully its got some proper windows 8 drivers. I saw the windows 8 dell slate spec on the register and it didnt look much different to these.

[RabbieBurns]

Installed win8 release preview but cant seem to get any wireless driver working? Which did you use @AngryTechnician?

 

ALso, i tried to install that BIOS A04 within win8 but it didnt work. Does it need to run from w7?

[Arthur]

tried to install BIOS A04 within win8 but it didn't work.

What happens if you update the BIOS from an elevated Command Prompt? e.g.

 

PEJUA04.exe /forceit /nvram

[SYNACK]

I'm not terribly impressed with ours - to be honest I think the ST was a bit of a misstep by Dell. I won't be buying any more of them, and I hope they've learned some lessons when it comes to designing Windows 8 slates in the near future.

@AngryTechnician - What kinds of hassels have you had with them?