[Soekris] PXE booting delay

[Kevan Benson]

On Friday 13 January 2006 03:15, Ted Phelps wrote:
> Hi Kevan,
>
> Kevan Benson writes:
> > Whenever PXE booting the net4801 to linux, after downloading the
> > pxelinux.0 file the soekris starts displaying weird characters in
> > the upper left corner of the terminal for 5-10 minutes, at which
> > time it then starts looking for the pxelinux config files (in the
> > regular order, ending at default), and loads any other files
> > (kernel, ramdisk, etc) it needs quickly and finishes the boot
> > process.
>
> That's very odd.

So I thought.  ;)

> > Is this the normal process?  I've never experienced a box taking 10
> > minutes to finish parsing the pxelinux.0 file before.
>
> I've happily been using PXE to net boot a net4801 into linux for over
> a year now; what you're seeing is certainly not normal.  I would guess
> that /tftpboot/pxelinux.0 is corrupt.

Well, I've used 3 now, so I don't think that's the problem.  Originally, I 
used the pxelinux.0 I've been using to kickstart the Mini-ITX boxes I have, 
and even some workstations and servers.  When that was having problems, I 
downloaded the version listed under the debian linux HOWTO as it was easily 
accessible, and the problem persists.  I have since downloaded the latest 
version of the syslinux package (3.11) and it made no difference.

> Could you tell us what versions of the BIOS and pxelinux you're using?

comBIOS ver. 1.28  20050529  Copyright (C) 2000-2005 Soekris Engineering.

-- 
- Kevan Benson
- A-1 Networks
- 707-570-2021 x102