RIS boot.ini problems

[stimpee]

I'm trying to install W2k3 via RIS on some Sun X4100 rackmounts. These have got LSI Logic 1064 serial SCSI controllers in them and are running AMD64 Opterons. After the RIS remotely installs the OS, upon reboot I get this message:

"Windows could not start because of a computer disk hardware configuration problem. Could not read from selected boot disk. Check boot path and disk hardware. Please check the Windows documentation about hardware disk configuration and your hardware disk configuration and your hardware reference manuals for additional information. Boot Failed."

Basically, the only things added to the SIF file are the drivers for the SAS disks. I have 10 machines to install this on and for 2 of them there were no problems (identical hardware) which is why its also confusing that it doesnt work on the others.

This happened each time I performed a RIS installation. I assumed that it

was a hardware problem so I ran it on two other servers with the same results.

After some internet searching I found hints that it might be something to do with the boot.ini and booting up with a Linux bootcd I found that the boot.ini looked like this:

[boot loader]

timeout=30

Default= signature(c400c400)disk(2)rdisk(0)partition(1)\Windows

[operating systems]

signature(3892r94)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition"

Rather than showing "multi(0)...\Windows", its using signature(c400c400) and after a further search I found the following MS kb article: http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=227704. This indicated a problem with INT13 which just isnt the case and the SCSI bios is not disabled. There is only one drive in there so I've no idea where the disk(2) came from. The solution I can think of to temporarily get around this is to use a bootdisk and manually edit the boot.ini or use RiPrep from one of the successful installs to use as an image for the others. Either way is certainly not a good solution.

Can anyone help with this and force the RIS to make a boot.ini with multi(0)disk(0) instead of signature(c400c400)disk(2)?

[tarquel]

hmm....

Just a quick thought....

Basically, the only things added to the SIF file are the drivers for the SAS disks.

You have restarted the BINL service [and associated services just to be sure] haven't you after adding the drivers for it?

I believe that the drivers have to be specific for the RIS task but I'm not too sure on the details of that as I use RogueSpear's AutoRIS /AutoImage kit along with BTS's Driverpacks.

Good luck

Nath

[stimpee]

The image for the OS is on the RIS server in normal directory structure not a binary image so the BINL service shouldnt matter should it?

I havent looked at AutoRIS in depth as it looks a bit more complex and overkill for whats needed here.

This is the drivers section added to the .sif:

[MassStorageDrivers]

"LSI Logic Fusion-MPT SAS Driver (XP x64)"="OEM"

[OEMBootFiles]

lsi_sas.sys

lsi_sas.inf

sxpam64.cat

txtsetup.oem

(yes I know theyre winxp x64 not w2k3 but they work, as proved on the other 2 installs)

[RogueSpear]

I never really designed AutoRIS or AutoImage to work with 2K3. AutoImage has a lot of the framework in place, but it's certainly not ready or tested when it comes to server operating systems.

[stimpee]

This is just a standard RIS image of a w2k3 OS on a network RIS server with the SAS drivers added to the SIF and a PXE boot setup to find the image on bootup. As far as I know, boot.ini is created on install and I just need to stop it from using signature and use multi. Until today I didnt even know what AutoRIS and AutoImage were (they do look handy tho).

[stimpee]

Well it seems like no-one here can help but I did "solve" the problem by hotswapping a hard disk from the working servers into all the ones with the wrong boot.ini's and copying the boot.ini over it. The RIS image had installed properly so it just required a reboot then. Of course, this defies the usefulness of RIS if you have to do stuff in the server room by hand....

[stimpee]

just a quick note that Microsoft have said that RIS isnt a supported feature in XP/2003 and that this is one of the known bugs on some hardware. It will be fixed for Vista. I guess I'll have to see if our MSDN subscription includes Windows Longhorn Server Beta 2 and test it from there.

[JuMz]

just a quick note that Microsoft have said that RIS isnt a supported feature in XP/2003

Umm...since when isn't RIS supported? I did not know this...