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+--- Thread: Issues booting two iSCSI targets simultaneously. (/showthread.php?tid=8220)
Issues booting two iSCSI targets simultaneously. - mshoemaker - 2016-11-02 21:04
I have two PCs that use iPXE to boot to iSCSI targets on a Windows Server 2008 machine. Both iSCSI targets are Windows 7. I spend over two and a half hours this morning turning the server and two hosts on and back off watching it work, and only one time did I see a failure to boot. I then as one of our test guys to try and hit first (and only) two attempts both fail.
I power all three machines on at the same time and each machine is attempting to boot via an integrated Intel I350 port. They continuously search for an address from DHCP while the server boots up.
I have both machines attempting to boot via a port connected to the same network switch. On the server side I have the tftp server and dhcp server setup for that network. I have dhcp reservations defined for the two machines. I am using the windows DHCP server to hand out undionly.kpxe to both machines, then based on the MAC address each reservation is setup to hand out a different ipxe script. The two scripts each contain the correct iqn for that target.
One of my machines usually fails the first time it gets an address. It fetches undionly, then gets the ipxe script, attempts to make the SAN connection, then fails stating the connection was reset and tries again. It has established a connection and booted every time after one or two of these connection reset messages.
My other machine has made the SAN connection every time, but once for me, and twice in a row for my tester, after making the SAN connection it says "Operating System Not Found." and freezes. Flip the reset switch and it retries, makes the SAN connection, and boots fine.
I can not find any information about what might be going on here to cause this Operating System not found message, nor anything to help me track down the connection reset issue on the other machine.
If anyone has any suggestions I would really appreciate it. I need this system to be rock solid so the end user can power the cabinet on and have everything boot up every time.
Thanks,
Matthew
RE: Issues booting two iSCSI targets simultaneously. - robinsmidsrod - 2016-11-07 10:06
You need to figure out which component of your stack is at fault. Is it ipxe, your iscsi target (windows server), your iscsi initiator (windows 7) or some network issue. iPXE can be debugged using e.g. syslog logging which should help you figure out how far it gets. Windows bootup can be debugged using windbg (don't ask me how). Network traffic can be monitored using Wireshark. Windows iscsi target I have no idea how to debug. Check MS documentation. Once you've gathered enough information to understand which component is failing then we might be able to help you out. Please share the information that allowed you to figure out how you got to your conclusion.
If you're willing to pay for support there is a vendor contact on ipxe.org you could try to get in touch with.