Unable to netboot MBP 15" late 2011 model

[rongrw]

Hi Guys,

I've built an OSX Lion 10.7.3 with Casper Imaging 8.52 netboot image. However, this image is unable to boot the Macbook Pro 15" (Late 2011) model. Its able to boot our earlier model Macs such as the Macbook Pro 13" (2011) and iMac 21" (mid 2010). I don't understand why the late 2011 MBP 15" cannot boot, considering I created the minimal base image on it. Below is an overview of the steps I used to create the NBI.

1. In Casper Admin, created a configuration consisting of the 10.7.3 "InstallESD.dmg" and "JavaForOSXLion_2012_003.pkg".
2. Compiled the configuration and downloaded the resulting DMG "Base OSX Lion.dmg" to the desktop.
3. Used Disk Utility to restore a blank partition with "Base OSX Lion.dmg".
4. Booted the Mac off the freshly restored partition and followed through the setup procedure.

From here on I followed the instructions in the JAMF article "Creating a Minimal Base OS Image for Restore or NetBoot/NetInstall Imaging". In the section "To use a minimal base image to create a restore image or ...", I followed steps 1 -> 15. I did not use the Netboot Automator Action.

When the late 2011 model of MBP 15" attempts to netboot, the Netboot logs on the server end clearly show that a connection was established but then didn't netboot.

Can anyone see what I'm doing wrong? Any suggestions would be most appreciated.

Cheers,

Ron.

[CasperSally]

Did you run a combo update to get to 10.7.3? I'd suggest trying a netboot image using 10.7.4 downloaded from Apple support combo update.

[stevewood]

What machine did you build the image on? It shouldn't. Matter if you are at 10.7.3, but you might try doing everything from that MBP to get the NBI created. So once you have the OS image, run System Image Utility from the MBP.

[matthew-c]

Is that machine getting the correct network settings from DHCP?
We have this same issue with new Mac Minis and 13" Macbook Pros

I may be wrong in your case but the image was a massive red herring for us and we wasted a lot of time doing multiple rebuilds to no avail.

For some reason if the mac doesn't get a full compliment of IP, router, DNS server, etc, it fails to boot from the netboot and so falls back to the next bootable volume.

This was never that case with earlier macs.

It seems the BSDP vendor class identifier has changed somehow and the DHCP server no longer gives out a valid set of network values or the EFI firmware has become more picky about it's network settings.

You can test this by reserving an IP for a test machine's MAC address in your DHCP server and try netbooting again.

Not ideal.

If i work out a way of correctly parsing the newer BSDP vendor class identifier i'll post it here.

cheers

Matt