[syslinux] lpxelinux hangs under Intel Boot Agent 1.3.81 (2.1 build 089) on Dell Optiplex 990 BIOS A16

[H. Peter Anvin]

On 07/10/2014 04:07 PM, Alexander Perlis wrote:
> Trying to PXE boot a Dell Optiplex 990 with BIOS A16, which has Intel
> Boot Agent 1.3.81 (2.1 build 089). It gets network and launches
> lpxelinux.0, I see the PXELINUX banner line, but there it hangs.
> 
> I tried both 6.03-pre18 and 5.10, same hanging behavior. If I instead
> use pxelinux.0 or gpxelinux.0, either 6.03-pre18 or 5.10 or 4.07, there
> are no problems. The problem seems isolated to lpxelinux.0, and isolated
> to this specific hardware/BIOS. We're otherwise PXE booting to
> lpxelinux.0 6.03-pre18 on a bunch of different machines without trouble.
> 
> I can update the BIOS to A18 and try again with possibly newer Intel
> Boot Agent code, if that report would help, but I only have this one
> machine of this type. Thus, before I upgrade to A18, in case any
> developers on this list want me to try anything with the current broken
> setup, if that will help isolate a problem in lpxelinux.0 (or a way for
> lpxelinux.0 to work around a problem in the Intel Boot Agent or Dell
> BIOS), I'll be glad to try some things and report back.
> 

Could you get a packet trace from the server, to see if you see any
traffic at all before it dies?

	-hpa