Description
When PXE booting an E74 is given and no F8 menu appears. Error: "PXE-E74 bad or missing pxe menu and or prompt information". Also, the PXE F8 menu does not come up. The proxy IP indicates the correct address. Re-deploying the PXE representative does not resolve the problem. Installing PXE rep on another machine does not resolve the issue.
Causes
- The PXE rep installation software is corrupt.
- Port 69 Traffic is blocked to the PXE Representative
- The PXE Agent embedded in the firmware of the NIC is handling DHCP option 43 incorrectly
- The BIOS and NIC firmware have a limited capacity for PXE Boot Menu options. This has been seen on a number of computers including:
- Lenovo machines with BIOS 3.11 or later
Resolution
Disable some PXE Boot Menu options
- It has been found that some updated versions of BIOS from some manufacturers do not properly handle large PXE boot menus
- To reduce the PXE boot options see: 'How to hide LinuxPE, WinPE, or DOS PE PXE Boot Options from the F8 Menu?'
- It is recommended to remove the LinuxPE and DosPE options, as they are normally not used
Obtain a new osdrep.msi installation package from LANDesk Support.
Copy the osdrep.msi file into the C:\Program Files\LANDesk\ManagementSuite\landesk\files folder.
Run the PXE Rep deployment script on the target machine.
Enable traffic on port 69 to the PXE Representative
- This would be configured in the client firewall, or possibly a switch on the network
DHCP Options 43 and 60 should not be used when using LANDesk to PXE boot
- Options 43 and 60 should not be configured on the DHCP server when using LANDesk PXE boot as they will conflict with the information and data sent to the client from the PXE representative. See below for step is resolving this.
Windows Server 2003
- Open DHCP on Windows 2003 Server
- Go to -> Scope -> Scope Options
- Right click and choose Scope Options and choose Configure Options
- Uncheck either option 060 and option 043 (they are not be needed)
DHCP Configuration when using LANDesk PXE Boot
When neither option 60 nor option 43 is set, PXE clients will wait until a PXE server contacts them. The LANDesk PXE representative will listen to DHCP discovery packets sent by PXE clients and answer at the same time as the DHCP server does. The LANDesk PXE and LANDesk PXE MTFTP services on the PXE representatives handle the requests made by clients attempting to PXE Boot.
In order to support PXE clients on a network, the DHCP server is usually configured in one of the following three modes:
- Option 60 not set, Option 43 not set
- Option 60 set to 'PXEClient', Option 43 not set
- Option 60 set to 'PXEClient', Option 43 set
When neither option 60 nor option 43 is set, PXE clients will have no clue where the PXE server is, and they will therefore wait until a PXE server contacts them. In this mode, the PXE server must listen to DHCP discovery packets sent by PXE clients and answer at the same time as the DHCP server does.
When option 60 is set to 'PXEClient', it means that the DHCP server knows where the PXE server is. If option 43 is not set, the PXE server is on the same computer as the DHCP server (same IP address). If option 43 is set, PXE clients must decode option 43 to know how to reach the PXE server.
In most situations, option 43 does not need to be setup, because the PXE server will either listen to DHCP discovery packets (DHCPProxy), or be on the same computer as the DHCP server. However, if the PXE server is on a separate subnet (it cannot listen to DHCP discovery packets), or if there are several PXE servers on the same subnet, option 43 is the only viable solution in order to instruct PXE clients on what to do.
For more information on PXE boot errors please see:
PXE Boot errors and descriptions.
For more information on troubleshooting PXE boot please see: