Remote Booting and Ghost 8
Our college purchased Symantec Ghost Corporate Edition 8. We have had success in creating images and pushing them out to computers on the domain and with ghost boot disks. However, we would now like to be able to push images out to machines that are not on the domain and do not have an operating system. Ghost corporate came with 3com dynamic boot services. I followed their documentation to the dot. Everything works up until the point where the tftp server tries to communicate with the client. At this point it times out. I was wondering if anyone knew what could be the problem.
Also, are there any other programs that will allow me to remotely boot a machine and push an image out to it.
One last thing, we tried using sysprep with ghost but it did not work at all. According to ghost's documentation we should have encountered a mini setup wizard after pushing the sysprepped image out to the machine. We did not encounter this, instead windows would not boot up at all, not even in safe mode.
Any help would be much appreciated.
Also, are there any other programs that will allow me to remotely boot a machine and push an image out to it.
One last thing, we tried using sysprep with ghost but it did not work at all. According to ghost's documentation we should have encountered a mini setup wizard after pushing the sysprepped image out to the machine. We did not encounter this, instead windows would not boot up at all, not even in safe mode.
Any help would be much appreciated.
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Posted by:
AnthraxAbdule
20 years ago
Use Console Boot Partition option to create a *.gho file then copy that file to a machine that has a burner on it. Burn the file along with ghost.exe to the CD (you want to make this CD Bootable, use nero). Finally, take the cd rom over to the machine a image the drive with that image. Then you will be able to use the console to install your images. The partion will always be there, but hidden from your windows users.
Posted by:
God
20 years ago
Which version of 3Com boot services are you using? You shouldn't even need ghost boot disks. You should be able to boot using PXE.
If you are not able to boot after deploying the image it is usually because the image is from a computer that has a different chipset than the target machine. The computers have to have identical chipsets in order to ghost them.
If you are not able to boot after deploying the image it is usually because the image is from a computer that has a different chipset than the target machine. The computers have to have identical chipsets in order to ghost them.
Posted by:
ModMan
19 years ago
I'm in a similar scenario.
We have new machines that have no O/S on. How do I get the machines to show in the Ghost Console, I can't believe I have to go through the whole CD booting up story with the .gho file etc etc.
We have PXE Boot NIC's on all machines, but Ghost 8.2 Corp doesn't come with a PXE Boot Server does it?
I might try install a 2000 server to do RIS and modify that PXE boot thing. But does anyone have a better suggestion?
We have new machines that have no O/S on. How do I get the machines to show in the Ghost Console, I can't believe I have to go through the whole CD booting up story with the .gho file etc etc.
We have PXE Boot NIC's on all machines, but Ghost 8.2 Corp doesn't come with a PXE Boot Server does it?
I might try install a 2000 server to do RIS and modify that PXE boot thing. But does anyone have a better suggestion?
Posted by:
ST170SP1
19 years ago
Hi Pete,
PXE
When you say the computer you are trying “push images out to machines that are not on the domain†are they on a LAN that can communicate with a domain or AD and have all the basic LAN services such as DHCP, WINS or are you trying to push images to a standalone network?
Wake-up on LAN
You can remote boot a PC (if it has wake up on lan enabled) by sending out a MAGIC PACKET on to the LAN. The packet could be targeted at individual worksations or a whole subnet. However once the workstation is booted another process or ‘bootstrap’ would have to take over the image load. I haven’t come across a way of doing this without first prepping the machine. There are some distribution tools that prep the disk by creating a virtual device, like a B: drive then booting from the image, creating an IP stack, Mapping a drive and running your imaging program of choice.
SYSPREP
Sysprep does work with ghost. I assume you tried applying the image back to the same machine. What command line did you use with SYSPREP?
Does the machine you are imaging have any mass storage devices that are not supported by XPSP2?
Thanks,
JamesT
PXE
When you say the computer you are trying “push images out to machines that are not on the domain†are they on a LAN that can communicate with a domain or AD and have all the basic LAN services such as DHCP, WINS or are you trying to push images to a standalone network?
Wake-up on LAN
You can remote boot a PC (if it has wake up on lan enabled) by sending out a MAGIC PACKET on to the LAN. The packet could be targeted at individual worksations or a whole subnet. However once the workstation is booted another process or ‘bootstrap’ would have to take over the image load. I haven’t come across a way of doing this without first prepping the machine. There are some distribution tools that prep the disk by creating a virtual device, like a B: drive then booting from the image, creating an IP stack, Mapping a drive and running your imaging program of choice.
SYSPREP
Sysprep does work with ghost. I assume you tried applying the image back to the same machine. What command line did you use with SYSPREP?
Does the machine you are imaging have any mass storage devices that are not supported by XPSP2?
Thanks,
JamesT
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