Netboot Client + DHCP server + Netboot Server

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Netboot Client + DHCP server + Netboot Server

I'm not a Netinstall/Netboot expert.

I wonder if BSDP supports having the Netboot Server role and the DHCP IP assignation role in 2 different servers.

i.e. in a regular PXE environment I can have a regular DHCP server providing only IPs and a proxyDHCP in the same network segment providing only the net booting information. This is pretty handy when running a PXE server where we cannot touch the corporate “shielded” DHCP server.

How can I do this with Netboot? I want to boot my Mac getting its IP from the corporate DHCP server and taking the booting information from the Netinstall/Netboot server both located at the same network segment without DHCP collisions.

Does anybody know if this can be done today?

Best,

Patrick

OS X Server

Posted on Nov 16, 2013 5:45 AM

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Answer 1

Nov 18, 2013 2:42 AM in response to _pat

Yes this is possible and is I suspect the way most people run it.

Your clients will use the main DHCP server to first get an IP address (this includes NetBoot clients), and then the NetBoot clients make a second NetBoot specific request to ask the NetBoot server to identify itself. A normal DHCP server will ignore this second request but the NetBoot server will answer.

The main problem hit is that like a real DHCP server and clients, the NetBoot server needs to be on the same network segment as the clients. If you have the NetBoot server on a different network or VLAN then it will not be contactable by the clients.

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Answer 2

_pat Author

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Nov 18, 2013 2:29 PM in response to John Lockwood

I just found the BSDP document; reading it now; thanks.

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Answer 3

Apr 10, 2014 2:58 AM in response to _pat

_pat, would you mind posting a link to that document please? My Network guys need to know how to configure our routers for OS X image deployment.

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