Re: Driver disk loading via NFS fails on Cisco switch, OK on Dell

whitivery <[email protected]> wrote:

>david klein <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>>Check to see if the client, switch and up-stream router agree on maximum
>>frame-size (i.e. if one is trying to do jumbo-frames and the other can't,
>>it can cause troubles). Make sure the switch-port that the client is using
>>is setup as an access-port, not a trunk. Set the client's port for
>>spanning-tree portfast and turn on BPDU-guard.
>
>Thank you for the response.  Had already tried spanning-tree portfast
>before turning off spanning-tree entirely, no difference.  I will look
>into the other things you mention.
>
>Updated observations:
>
>- Problem happens exactly the same with a switch at the opposite
>  end of the complexity spectrum - Netgear 5 port 10/100Mbps
>  Switch FS605 v3.
>
>- I noticed that on the good switch, you see two eth0 dialogs
>  flash up before it proceeds; on a bad switch, only see one eth0
>  dialog then the empty blue screen.
>
>- If while it's in the failure state with the empty blue screen,
>  I move the target's network connection to the good switch, it
>  immediately takes off and continues the kickstart process
>  properly.

Answering myself here: problem is solved.

I was using NFS to load the driver disk.  I changed to HTTP, no more
problem, works with Netgear and Cisco just fine.


>
>>On Sun, Nov 13, 2011 at 1:53 PM, whitivery <[email protected]>wrote:
>>
>>> I have a working Cobbler server, using it to load units with
>>> CentOS 5.7.  It works fine with a simple Dell 2716 switch
>>> connecting the server and targets.  Also with a LinkSys RV016.
>>>
>>> Substituting a Cisco 2960 switch, it fails.  It network boots,
>>> shows the PXE menu, I choose an entry, it gets a DHCP address on
>>> its eth0, and starts loading including getting its kickstart via
>>> HTTP.  But when it goes to load the driver disk image via NFS, it
>>> hangs.  The Anaconda Alt-F4 screen shows it not seeing the NFS
>>> server; after 2 minutes of trying, it times out and the Alt-F4
>>> screen shows an error dump.
>>>
>>> Tried the switch with and without RST (rapid spanning tree)
>>> active, no difference.
>>>
>>> The switch seems to work OK for normal network operations outside
>>> the kickstart environment, for what we use.
>>>
>>> Any idea what it might be that could be interfering with the NFS
>>> disk driver loading step?
>>>
>>>
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