Q: 10.11.4 not loading from NetInstall

From my tests today, no you are not.  It boots flawlessly on anything with a built-in NIC, Retinas are another story.  I found the boot will often stall as you describe with a Thunderbolt-Ethernet adapter.

I've had near 100% success with a USB-Ethernet adapter, however.  If you have one of those around, give it a whirl to see if you have better luck.

I'm having the same issue here on my Retina MacBook Pros. Hangs when booting with a Thunderbolt > Ethernet adapter. Tried an Apple USB > Ethernet adapter and it didn't see the NetInstall set (adapter not recognized?).

Going to try a few variations today to see if I can figure anything else out.

If you are able, in Server, change it from "Make available over HTTP" to "Make available over NFS".  I had a little more success with that.

Got the USB > Enet adapter to work, however machine still wouldn't boot from the 10.11.4 NetInstall set. It does boot from 10.11.3 just fine.

Have all my image on NFS as standard. Still no netbooting from USB or Thunderbolt. An older MacBook Pro works OK over ethernet.

Moved the USB > Ethernet adapter to the right hand side USB port. The machine netbooted from the 10.11.4 NetInstall just fine. Then moved the adapter back to the left USB port and tried netbooting. It did not work.

At first, I believed it was adapter related - but I quickly learned that no matter what connection I used (TB, USB, Enet, WiFi), trying to boot a hosted image (either NetInstall, NetBoot, or even the Apple Diagnostics) would have a 10 percent success rate when using Server with 10.11.4. I am currently building a MacMini server with 10.10 and going to move over my hosted images as a test. I will reply back after thats been done - people on the JAMF board are reporting success with that.

Looks like it may be an issue with 10.11.4 (although it felt like it started getting chunky with 10.11.3)

My NetBoot server is running 10.7.5 (old, but it works). Still no luck with getting 10.11.4 NetInstall set to work. Trying now on a recent MacBook Air. No booting with Thunderbolt or Wifi with 10.11.4. Both work with 10.11.3.

10.11.4 is working over a USB-Ethernet adapter, on both of the Air's USB ports. Though it's only 100Mb. Will try to get my hands on a USB3-GbEnet adapter.

Spoke to soon. Booting from USB adapter only works on the left USB port. Right side stops loading as described in the original topic post.

It looks like the issue is within the update to the System Image Utility.

Any image I create on any other version of the SIU work/boots flawlessly every time. Only images that I build on the newest version of SIU fail 3/4 of the way through 90 percent of the time.

I have been working with Apple Engineers through our enterprise support channel. They have been made aware of the issue, but we are in a hurry up and wait situation.

The workaround for this right now is to build images on an older version of the SIU.

I have confirmed this with Apple last Night that this is an Apple Bug in 10.11.4, not SIU. Interestingly enough they inquired about the impact this had on my business and what upcoming purchases this would hold back, i.e. how much $$ was I planning on spending on new Apple hardware. If this is how Apple is allocating resources to fix bugs then I say if your having this issue, call Apple Support and once they escalate you to Enterprise Level 3 tell them what your $$ plans on for Apple hardware. If they get enough reports they should fix this sooner rather than later...

LJS

For what it's worth, I've been testing all day. I can get 10.11.1, 10.11.4 and Yosemite to install to an older MacBook Air (late 2012 maybe) without problems. I can't get anything to install on the late 2013 MacBook Pro retina. I've used both Thunderbolt and USB to Ethernet adaptors.