[gPXE] gPXE, nc380t (bcm5706 / bnx2) sanboot iscsi connectivity and BIOS issues

[Shao Miller]

Marcin Kosieradzki wrote:
>
> On the machine with an old revision S5000PSL (with builtin VGA) (the
> one I was describing in previous email): if I didn't
> press ctrl+B there was a "Press F2 to enter SETUP" message displayed and
> sometimes after pressing F2 it was changing into "Entering SETUP", but
> nothing happened.
>
There are two Control-B prompts from gPXE, one during POST and another 
when it's gPXE's turn to boot.  In general, it's best to avoid the 
POST-time prompt, since gPXE will get going before POST has completed, 
and we've seen scenarios where the memory map is incomplete.  Also, 
other devices might not have initialized, such as a RAID controller 
providing an INT 0x13 hook for HDD access.
>
> On the machine with a newer revision S5000PSL (with builtin VGA),
> after not pressing ctrl+B in gpxe there was
> initialization message of second chipset on my NC380T (which I didn't
> turn off) displayed,
> something like "Press F1 to skip iSCSI". And then "Press F2 to enter 
> SETUP"....
>
It's possible to run out of option ROM space by having too many option 
ROMs.  Removing cards or possibly disabling them in BIOS setup might help.
>
> On the third machine with an old recision S5000VSA (with PCI VGA card
> and builtin VGA card disabled):
> If I pressed ctrl+B machine was immediately rebooted.
> If I didn't there was "press F2 to enter setup" and machine was
> rebooted after few seconds.
>
I've seen a gPXE ROM recently rebooting a particular model I have here, 
much as you've described.  I'll try to find the time to look into it.
>
> I'm planning to buy Intel PRO/1000 ET NIC, put it in lower number
> PCI-e port, boot OS from iSCSI, disable mba on
> both chipsets on NC380T and then continue to solve first issue, but
> this time probably running gPXE from USB stick.
>
Note that recently I tried to SAN-boot an HP ProLiant ML370 G5 computer, 
but the Windows had a Blue Screen of Death.  Quite familiar with 
SAN-booting, this suggests to me that the Windows NIC drivers might not 
be capable of completing the SAN-boot; perhaps they rely on user-land 
components or perhaps there's a filter driver that needs to be found and 
enabled at boot-time.  I don't know if this relates to your situation at 
all, but wanted to share.

Good luck!

- Shao Miller
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