NetBoot and ASD

Hi Chris,

You don't need SIU to make EFI binaries netbootable, just put them on your TFTP server and use the proper bless arguments. This is described in my blog post under the EFI headline.

You rule!!! I didn't know about this! filipp.lepalaan, would you be interested in speaking via email? I really could use another tech to bounce new ideas off of 🙂chris@capemac.com is my email address.

you can create ASD discs if you use the same version of SIU as the ASD disc. For example, 3S132 is a 10.5 based image, but 3S139 is a 10.6 based image. Create the .nbi folder on the appropriate computer, then copy/paste it to the netboot server you want to use (it may be the same computer for some people depending on which OS your server is running).

to make EFI boot, make a copy of the .nbi folder onto the desktop and open the NBImageInfo.plist file inside of the copy. Edit the Name, Description, and Index keys. the index number MUST be unique. Next, mount the EFI image, and in terminal copy the contents to the i386 folder (i.e. /Users/Jason/Desktop/3S132.nbi/i386). you need to use the -r flag, so the whole command would be "cp -r * /Users/Jason/Desktop/3S132.nbi/i386"...

next go to that directory in terminal and run this command "cp boot.efi booter"

Finally, copy the .nbi folder into your /Library/Netboot/NetBootSP0/ folder and make sure it shows up in SIU.

then it will work! I have tested this with 3S148, 3S139, and 3S132.

I have it so you can select these in AST, however they error out. If you just select them in the boot menu though it works normally, and you can also select to boot from them inside of any OS in system preferences --> start-up disk.

I hope this helps!

Thanks for the tips on creating Netboot images. I have gotten 3S132 EFI to work properly using the method you describe above, however the later ASD's, namely 3S138, 3S139, etc. always hang when booting into the efi. They hang at the "Searching for hardware to run tests" status in EFI boot. I was suspecting a difference as 3S138 and later has a folder within the i386 folder called x86_64. I have tried adding the same boot files into that folder, however no change. How did you get 3S139 and later to not hang during boot?

am not having them hang at all. I actually just created the OS and EFI images for 3S150 and although it does dit on searching for hardware for a minute or so it does eventually load up. I am seeing the same behavior just booting from a 3S150 EFI disc though so I didn't think much of it.

I think it was this article:

http://unflyingobject.com/blog/stories/asd2nb/

HTH,

-filipp

Thanks so much for digging this out. I'll check out your blog too.