TFTP Server for imaging

[nibblesandbits]

Just wondering if there is such a thing as a PXE-server for imaging. I'm thinking it would be cool if I could connect a clients computer to my network & KVM, turn it on and boot via PXE (to my business server) and then it'll automatically image that computer before I ever boot into windows. Just in the rare case, booting up would unleash a crazy load of viruses or something. Who knows when some psychotic person may try to get you for losing all their data by knowingly installing "next boot" viruses.

I'm not being paranoid, that's just worst case scenario. The reason I'm really in need of something like this is because I have a horrible habit of not imaging my clients machines and I think if I could make it as simple as hitting "f12 to network boot" and pressing a few keys, then going on to my next machine, I'd do it and make it part of my workflow.

Thanks guys.

 

[Davis Computer Services]

I would be pretty interested in this for the same reasons. Sometimes I can't be bothered for what I think will be a small job that turns out to be a bigger one. I haven't been burnt yet, but I don't want to risk it all the time.

 

[nibblesandbits]

I thought Acronis Disk Director might, but I'm "e-thumbing" through the manual and don't see anything, the closest thing is a boot disc, but I don't even want THAT hassle. I want a PXE server dang it! lol I know there has to be something.

Will continue googling unless you all come up with something.


Not what I was looking for, but this is cool. It will automatically take an image from a server and resize it to the hard drive by using a PXE linux boot:

http://www.wiul.org/

Combine that with a SYSPREP'ed image and you could re-image an entire school or corporation over a gigabit network in less than a week (and less than a day's worth of actual LABOR) 8) NICEEEE

Strike that - I see that you could just "ghostcast" with Symantec's software and it's probably easier anyway. Seems like all I can find are things that reimage, not TAKE AN image of the computer you just brought in to your shop.

 

[thecoldone06]

One thing you might consider before using TFTP. TFTP offers no authentication and if you start imaging client machines to a TFTP server they would be available to anybody looking for them. You might want to consider either SFTP or at least regular FTP.

 

[nibblesandbits]

One thing you might consider before using TFTP. TFTP offers no authentication and if you start imaging client machines to a TFTP server they would be available to anybody looking for them. You might want to consider either SFTP or at least regular FTP.

PXE is the key here. TFTP server is just to boot the client computer into an "imaging environment" via it's own image. I'm thinking this would all have to be done via a thinstation version of linux. I don't know. I just know it has to be possible, and whoever comes up with this solution if it hasn't been thought of, is going to have a pretty nice project on their hands that a lot of people would benefit from.

 

[ZPR]

The only way I know to is to use Linux. You'll need to create a new initial ram disk image which is what the Linux kernel uses to start and load drives to find your hard drive, only you'll add network drivers, and a few other things like a custom init script, and there's a program called partimage and you can have it in batch mode, that takes care of making the image. But than you run into issues cause in batch mode you need the exact hard drive's path, like /dev/hda for the first ide hard drive or /dev/sda for the first sata hard drive, but you could always make a shell script to detect which one it is.

Also, this way you could make a CD-ROM with the kernel and initial ram disk and have a Linux supported USB Network Card. That way if there PC can't net boot or there card isn't supported, you have a backup alternative.

 

[nibblesandbits]

The only way I know to is to use Linux. You'll need to create a new initial ram disk image which is what the Linux kernel uses to start and load drives to find your hard drive, only you'll add network drivers, and a few other things like a custom init script, and there's a program called partimage and you can have it in batch mode, that takes care of making the image. But than you run into issues cause in batch mode you need the exact hard drive's path, like /dev/hda for the first ide hard drive or /dev/sda for the first sata hard drive, but you could always make a shell script to detect which one it is.

Also, this way you could make a CD-ROM with the kernel and initial ram disk and have a Linux supported USB Network Card. That way if there PC can't net boot or there card isn't supported, you have a backup alternative.

Wow, after reading all that, I see why it hasn't been done. Oh well, keep your eye out guys, still HOPING there is something out there.

 

[nibblesandbits]

I THINK I FOUND IT!!!! WOOOO!!!

http://clonezilla.org/clonezilla-live/livepxe.php - Link goes straight to how to set up your PXE server for boot from your customer's machines to image directly to the server.

Pyramid Technologies on the forum had just posted this over in the repair tool of the week suggestions. I just happened to be skipping around the forums and found it. I think it's exactly what I was wanting!!!! I'm pretty damn happy now. lol

*update: installing TFTPd from http://tftpd32.jounin.net/download/Tftpd32-3.33-setup.exe - NOW* (you have to find your own TFTP server, so I'm using this one for Windows)
*update: installed TFTPd and ran a test DHCP boot via PXE on a Compaq Presario. It obtained an IP (know this because I looked at the program on my server and it shows it as assigning x.x.x.x.220 to the mac of my compaq) so - so far so good. Downloading the Clonezilla zip file now. Sourceforge is pushing it SLOWWWWWWWWWW 1 minute remaining @ 300k/sec. Will post back.
*update: stuck at this point. Trying to figure out what it means by editing the config file - only thing is, I don't see how that config file has anything to do with my client computer saying: "no boot file sent" - or something like that, it says it too fast for me to read it... will post back. (I'm going to make a video tutorial if I get this working and post a link here) so no other techs have to screw with this mess. lol
*update: booted the machine from the pxelinux.0 had problems with it reading the file "linux" and "initrd" they are named wrong according to PXE... they are named vmlinuz1 and initrd1 in the clonezilla install. Will post back with findings

Can't get past this error. My config file points to the vmlinuz1 file and I even changed the pxeconfig.cfg file to see if it would "notice" the alteration. It spit a different error than the one you are seeing here when I did that. This is annoying me.

 

[14049752]

You can do this with Norton Ghost and a Ghostcast server. I have no idea what it costs, though. I found an old version of DeployCenter on Amazon for $150...(a version from before Symantec bought them).

Acronis also offers Snap Deploy that does the same thing. Again, no idea on the cost/licensing structure...I only searched to confirm that they have something like that.

 

[nibblesandbits]

what would be the benefit of imagine it it a tftp server first? I mean sure. PXE booting to a TFTP/SFTP server to deploy hundreds of work machines, sure. But would it not be faster, better, and easier just to backup to an external hard drive via a boto disk? I mean unless you have a 1000mbit network, but even then, are you getting a true 1000 all the way up and down?

Because I can just plug it in to my network, hit f12, and bam. Imaging. I don't know. It's fun, okay?!?!?!?! Leave me alone. lol

At any rate though - I'm getting very close to getting it to work. After how many hours?

 

[nibblesandbits]

Oh hey no offense, I am all for experimentation and ingenuity!

lol there was no offense taken, and no hostility toward you in my last post (it's sad you have to clarify these things on this forum anymore)

I think it's obvious that no matter what anyone says the economy or SOMETHING is getting to us techs. We all seem like a ****** off / stressed out bunch of people. lol

Turns out I can't get this to work, ANYBODY HAVE ANY KNOWLEDGE OF LINUX?! I need some help. I'm so close. I'm getting an error saying:

nfsmount: need a path

I'm going to give up for today though. I've ben playing with this for 2 hours. Time to go home, kick back, and relax. Will be watching the forums from the iphone.

 

[nibblesandbits]

nfsmount: need a path

Means it needs the path to mount the drive like this

mount -t ntfs /dev/hda1 /mnt/windowsdrive/

so, mount a type of NTFS file system located at /dev/hda1 and mount it to the destination folder of /mnt/something

You/it likely didn't do the mount command right.

it didn't. I don't know. It's driving me crazy. I want this to work, it's a neat concept, and although a little slow, it's still cool to know I can just plug a machine in - go to lunch, and have it done when I get back, without waiting on a boot disc, which takes 5 minutes to boot up, then configuring the program within the boot disc to image it, etc etc

Maybe this is more trouble than it's worth. It was fun, but now it's just aggravating me. lol

 

[ZPR]

nfsmount needs a path, you specify it on the command line using the nfsroot option

the complete syntax of nfsroot as quoted out of the linux kernel source docs

nfsroot=[<server-ip>:]<root-dir>[,<nfs-options>]

If the `nfsroot' parameter is NOT given on the command line,
the default "/tftpboot/%s" will be used.

<server-ip> Specifies the IP address of the NFS server.
The default address is determined by the `ip' parameter
(see below). This parameter allows the use of different
servers for IP autoconfiguration and NFS.

<root-dir> Name of the directory on the server to mount as root.
If there is a "%s" token in the string, it will be
replaced by the ASCII-representation of the client's
IP address.

<nfs-options> Standard NFS options. All options are separated by commas.
The following defaults are used:
port = as given by server portmap daemon
rsize = 4096
wsize = 4096
timeo = 7
retrans = 3
acregmin = 3
acregmax = 60
acdirmin = 30
acdirmax = 60
flags = hard, nointr, noposix, cto, ac

also, you must have the folder that it needs connected to exported via a change in the config file /etc/exports which controls what folders and who can access them via NFS.

 

[msherman]

DUH! I guess I didn't see where it said nfsmount in your error> I Must have read it as ntfsmount or w/e. Sorry for the misinformation.

Dont feel bad. I read it the same way. LOL! Was going to type pretty much what you typed.

 

[Howellga]

Have you checked out FOG project, an open source disk imaging server that uses PXE to boot clients.

fogproject.org/

 

[nibblesandbits]

Have you checked out FOG project, an open source disk imaging server that uses PXE to boot clients.

fogproject.org/

Looking at it now. Thanks for the heads up!

 

[nibblesandbits]

what would be the benefit of imagine it it a tftp server first? I mean sure. PXE booting to a TFTP/SFTP server to deploy hundreds of work machines, sure. But would it not be faster, better, and easier just to backup to an external hard drive via a boto disk? I mean unless you have a 1000mbit network, but even then, are you getting a true 1000 all the way up and down?

Do any of you have a sysprepped image without a serial number? Is this even possible? I'd like to keep one on hand that way I can use FOG to push that image to a client's computer if it's broken. I'll keep the image fresh with the latest AV updates and windows updates. Think about the time saved when reinstalling if all the updates were rolled into the image you are pushing. Wow, sounds nice. I'm sure some of you have alternative ways of doing just this, but I've got my mind set on using an image server, more specifically, FOG.

Let me know if this is possible and how to go about it. I remember reading the sysprep documentation but it was a PITA to do so I was hoping I could find a sysprepped image already then just copy the serial off the side of their computer and put their key on their install.

Correct me if I'm way off base here.