[syslinux] UEFI syslinux PXE boot issues

AL13N alien at rmail.be
Thu Aug 17 01:55:56 PDT 2023


Steve Rikli schreef op 2023-08-16 16:31:
> On Wed, Aug 16, 2023 at 02:05:33PM +0200, AL13N via Syslinux wrote:
>> Joakim Tjernlund schreef op 2023-08-16 13:15:
>> > On Thu, 1970-01-01 at 00:00 +0000, AL13N via Syslinux wrote:
>> > >
>> > > I'm used to non-UEFI PXE boot, and I use it for my network installer
>> > > since forever ago.
>> > >
>> > > Looking up how to UEFI PXE boot, I use the syslinux.efi file and
>> > > allthough it was loaded and stuff, nothing happend after it, I had at
>> > > least expected the ldlinux64 to be requested from the TFTP server, but
>> > > nothing.
>> > >
>> > > After searching, I noticed someone asking to test the new pre-release,
>> > > and so I downloaded the 6.04 version. I replaced the syslinux.efi file
>> > > only, and I got a lot more success. I symlinked the pxelinux.cfg dir
>> > > and images so it could find the files it needed.
>> > >
>> > > Then I got the prompt, I typed "install" to trigger that menu item and
>> > > it transferred the vmlinuz file (14sec for 11MB). Then the initrd
>> > > (47MB), which takes a long time, but does not ever show the "ok", even
>> > > after the transfer was complete (as far as I could tell from the TFTP
>> > > server), which takes more than a minute. after some seconds of nothing
>> > > happening, it just reboots...
>> > >
>> > > Can anyone help met out here?
>> >
>> > If I recall correctly, UEFI is somewhat broken. Try iPXE instead.
>> 
>> I tried to use the iPXE /usr/share/ipxe/ipxe-x86_64.efi, but it had 
>> some
>> issues with the network card, iirc, I think I saw the network 
>> interface
>> down, though it likely uses a wrong driver?
>> 
>> Still, the newer 6.04 one did work, except for loading the large 
>> initrd file
>> (which took more than 1 minute, which may be the reason it times 
>> out?),
>> which is probably not UEFI related?
> 
> Suggest you try downloading large initrd files with http rather than 
> tftp.
> 
> We started having more frequent timeouts during initrd download around 
> the
> time RHEL8 became more prevalent in our environment, so we just 
> switched
> to http going forward (after CentOS/RHEL 7) since the initrd images 
> seemed
> to be on a growth trend over time.
> 
> Like you suspect, we generally found this to be a problem independent 
> of
> UEFI; it was simply that the modern hardware we were getting was more
> frequently coming with UEFI rather than traditional BIOS, and we needed
> the newer linux releases to support the newer hardware, etc. so the
> situation came together basically at the same time.

We don't have RH's in our environment, but I suspect the initrd's are 
just growing larger to support more stuff (especially installers).

Combined with a slowdown in TFTP transfers (I've seen this the last few 
years), it seems to timeout

Unfortunately, trying http link for the initrd did not work on this HP 
laptop... maybe this laptop firmware does not support it...

Regards,

Maarten


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