chainload EFI from alternate TFTP server

[eterle]

We use PXE boot to bring up a custom grub menu (pxelinux.cfg/default) when installing a new system. From this menu we can choose the OS which will then get installed over the network.

I now need to add the Solaris 11 to this menu, but it resides on a different TFTP server.
All I want this entry to say is: load this boot image ( grub2netx64.efi ) from that TFTP server.
I thought I could get away with something like:
kernel chain.c32 (or pxechain.com or pxechn.c32)
append <tftp_server_ip>::grub2netx64.efi (or tftp://<server_ip>/grub2netx64.efi)

But it seems I can't chainload (is that even the right term?) an efi image.
I looked into switching to grub2, but I have been thoroughly unable to find how to rewrite my menu items in grub.cfg so I gave that up. I couldn't even get the simple "localboot 0" to work.

Can iPXE be of help to me?
Thanks for your help.
D

[eterle]

I think I could boot undionly.kpxe, then pick up boot.ipxe to bring up a menu, as described in https://gist.github.com/robinsmidsrod/2234639, and in that menu, include all the desired install options.

So I set up undionly.kpxe, I can see my dhcp client load the file:

101 0.00652 TFTP Read "undionly.kpxe" (octet)
102 0.00198 UDP D=1193 S=45180 LEN=23
103 0.00015 TFTP Ack block 0
104 0.00075 Data block 1 (1468 bytes)
105 0.00017 TFTP Ack block 1
106 0.00012 Data block 2 (1468 bytes)
107 0.00027 TFTP Ack block 2
108 0.00010 TFTP Data block 3 (1468 bytes)
109 0.00016 TFTP Ack block 3
110 0.00010 Data block 4 (1468 bytes)
111 0.00016 TFTP Ack block 4
..
194 0.00012 Data block 46 (1179 bytes)
195 0.00027 TFTP Ack block 46

Then, all I have time to see is "boot failed" and it loads the existing grub from the hard disk.
The network card is Broadcom BCM5719 A1 which is "expected to work" according to http://ipxe.org/appnote/hardware_drivers.
Bootcode 1.47
MBA 17.2.1
EFI 17.4.8

I'm at a loss for how to troubleshoot this. Any help is appreciated.
Thanks.
Darie

[NiKiZe]

(2017-12-04 13:57)eterle Wrote:  I think I could boot undionly.kpxe

That is for PCBIOS only, Is the title incorrect or are you using the wrong files?

If you want efi, prebuilt binaries can be found at boot.ipxe.org
use ipxe.efi for full drivers, or snponly.efi for the efi equivalent of undionly
See http://ipxe.org/appnote/buildtargets for notes on what is what

[eterle]

Indeed, that was not clear to me at all. I was using the wrong file. I changed to snponly.eif now have the iPXE banner and prompt.
Thank you!
Darie