+- iPXE discussion forum (https://forum.ipxe.org)
+-- Forum: iPXE user forums (/forumdisplay.php?fid=1)
+--- Forum: General (/forumdisplay.php?fid=2)
+--- Thread: Multiple iSCSI Targets (/showthread.php?tid=6937)
Multiple iSCSI Targets - dot64 - 2013-06-03 22:42
Hi
Is it possible to load multiple iSCSI targets in an iPXE script? I have one iSCSI target that contains a Windows 7 installer that is bootable and the other target will be the location where it will be installed. I was able to mount both iSCSI targets via iPXE and boot from the target with the windows 7 installation but when Windows install got to the point to select a disk, only the windows 7 target was there.
I am wondering if the keep-san option has anything to do with this issue. Any thoughts?
Thanks.
RE: Multiple iSCSI Targets - robinsmidsrod - 2013-06-05 09:42
Only one iSCSI volume/target can be present in the iBFT. The last one you use in your script will be the one present in the iBFT and should show up in Windows disk manager. I would suggest you use the method in http://ipxe.org/howto/winpe to boot the installer instead of trying to sanboot multiple volumes.
If you have problems with the disk not showing up, even after all this, you might be suffering from the default gateway issue. Try putting set netX/gateway 0.0.0.0 before your sanhook/sanboot command to work around this issue in the Windows iSCSI boot support. Also be aware when you use wimboot to boot WinPE with iSCSI hooked, you'll get two pauses of approx. 1 minute during bootup. We haven't found any way to avoid that yet.
RE: Multiple iSCSI Targets - dot64 - 2013-06-07 14:03
Thanks for the recommendation. I was successfully able to boot via wimboot to winpe then loaded win7 install from IIS.
After installing Windows, I ran into a few snags which i was able to resolve after a bit of research. One issue i face now is accessing a network share on the server that is hosting the iSCSI that I am booting off of. I cannot access it. I found out via the article below that this is by design.
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/938120
I am using the IP address of the location to connect to the iSCSI during iPXE prior to booting. Although I could setup the shared storage on another system, if its possible I'd like to keep current setup the way it is. Any suggestions on this issue?
RE: Multiple iSCSI Targets - robinsmidsrod - 2013-06-07 23:47
Well, you described the issue a bit cumbersome, but if you're getting the error in the linked article, you're basically trying to connect to your SMB/CIFS server with two different user names at the same time. Windows doesn't support that. If the installation files is located on a server share on the same server, you'll need to connect to other resources on the same server using the same username/password/domain combination. If the installation folder is mapped using the guest account, then you'll need to use guest for other resources as well. If you don't use guest, make sure you use the same credentials. Sometimes caching in Windows can be a bitch and you need to restart the computer to make it kill the open sessions. I don't know the manual way of resetting the services that cache/hold the session open. I'd like to know, if anyone has an answer to that one, though.
Your iSCSI connection should not interfere with this, though. iSCSI and CIFS are two completely different protocols that don't share anything. iSCSI is a network block level disk protocol, while SMB/CIFS is a network filesystem.