Syslinux - Aug 2009 - Incompatibility using pxelinux 3.80 or later and setupldr.exe from windows XP 32 bits

Hello

I'm working on my RIS server; I got a problem when I use pxelinux.0 to
load setupldr.exe from windows XP 32bits (both home and corporate)

Here is how I configure a working server, then how to modify it to
reproduce the bug:
========================
I suppose you got
-a dhcp server configured to load pxelinux.0 to client computer.
-a working tftp server (mine is tftpd-hpa, with a rule to convert
backslashes to slashes ans to convert uppercase to lowercase)

First, let start textmode setup without pxelinux

use cabextract to get startrom.n12 from your windows source
(/i386/startrom.n1_). Rename it to pxelinux.0, put it in your tftp root
use cabextract to get setupldr.exe from your windows source
(/i386/setupldr.ex_). Rename it to ntldr, put it in your tftp root
copy from your windows source ntdetect.com to your tftp root.

Start the client computer the windows textmode setup will fail because
he cannot find winnt.sif. I'm using the french windows source: the error
message is
"Le fichier INF winnt.sif est endommag? ou manquant, statut 21"
The PXE server is working.

Reproducing the bug
========================

Create in yout tftp root a folder named pxelinux.cfg
Create pxelinux.cfg/default with thid content

    DEFAULT menu.c32

    TIMEOUT 0
    PROMPT  0

    MENU TITLE Multiboot

            LABEL Windows XP Home
                KERNEL startrom.0

    MENU END

rename pxelinux.0 in yout tftp root into startrom.0 (this is
startrom.n12 from windows source)
copy from syslinux 3.81 the file pxelinux.0 into yout tftp root
copy from syslinux 3.81 the file menu.c32into yout tftp root

When you launch your client computer and select "Windows XP Home" the
textmode setup will start and stop on the message
"Le fichier INF j8??j9,,j:??j;??j<??j=??j>??,???? est endommag? ou
manquant, sta."
The filename cannot be reproduced: most of characters are non
alphanumerics characters. I replaced them by question marks.
Here is the filename as received by the TFTP server :
RRQ from 192.168.0.173 filename
j8?#002j9?#002j:?#002j;?#002j<?#002j=?#002j>?#002j??q<8D

The bug can be reproduced with syslinux strictly later than version 3.75

I cannot investigate more about the bug.

If you replace pxelinux.0 and menu.c32 with version 3.75 and earlier,
the textmode setup works fine.

Op 20090815 om 17:06 schreef Thierry Bugier:
> Hello
> 
> I'm working on my RIS server; I got a problem when I use pxelinux.0 to
> load setupldr.exe from windows XP 32bits (both home and corporate)
> 
> Here is how I configure a working server, then how to modify it to
> reproduce the bug:
> ========================> 
> I suppose you got
> -a dhcp server configured to load pxelinux.0 to client computer.
> -a working tftp server (mine is tftpd-hpa, with a rule to convert
> backslashes to slashes ans to convert uppercase to lowercase)
> 
> First, let start textmode setup without pxelinux
> 
> use cabextract to get startrom.n12 from your windows source
> (/i386/startrom.n1_). Rename it to pxelinux.0, put it in your tftp root
> use cabextract to get setupldr.exe from your windows source
> (/i386/setupldr.ex_). Rename it to ntldr, put it in your tftp root
> copy from your windows source ntdetect.com to your tftp root.
> 
> Start the client computer the windows textmode setup will fail because
> he cannot find winnt.sif. I'm using the french windows source: the
error
> message is
> "Le fichier INF winnt.sif est endommag? ou manquant, statut 21"
> The PXE server is working.
> 
> Reproducing the bug
> ========================> 
> 
> Create in yout tftp root a folder named pxelinux.cfg
> Create pxelinux.cfg/default with thid content
> 
>     DEFAULT menu.c32
> 
>     TIMEOUT 0
>     PROMPT  0
> 
>     MENU TITLE Multiboot
> 
>             LABEL Windows XP Home
>                 KERNEL startrom.0
> 
>     MENU END
> 
> rename pxelinux.0 in yout tftp root into startrom.0 (this is
> startrom.n12 from windows source)
> copy from syslinux 3.81 the file pxelinux.0 into yout tftp root
> copy from syslinux 3.81 the file menu.c32into yout tftp root
> 
> When you launch your client computer and select "Windows XP Home"
the
> textmode setup will start and stop on the message
> "Le fichier INF j8??j9,,j:??j;??j<??j=??j>??,???? est endommag?
ou
> manquant, sta."
> The filename cannot be reproduced: most of characters are non
> alphanumerics characters. I replaced them by question marks.
> Here is the filename as received by the TFTP server :
> RRQ from 192.168.0.173 filename
> j8?#002j9?#002j:?#002j;?#002j<?#002j=?#002j>?#002j??q<8D
> 
> The bug can be reproduced with syslinux strictly later than version 3.75
> 
> I cannot investigate more about the bug.
> 
> If you replace pxelinux.0 and menu.c32 with version 3.75 and earlier,
> the textmode setup works fine.

And I have no acces to startrom.0
Neither to cabextract and not to startrom.n12

So where the Original Poster did bring a problem to the mailinglist,
is this E-mail about returning that problem. [1]

IMO should the OP make two tarballs (or zip files)
Each with all the TFTP files for a RIS install.
One is "version 3.75" and the other "version 3.80"

And put them on the Internet.



Cheers
Geert Stappers
knowing that ignoring has a minimal learning value


[1] : At least about asking more information.

Good day Thierry,

Regarding your RIS-like setup for Windows XP using PXELINUX:

The Windows XP RIS setup code is known to read and use a portion of
memory which is uninitialized.  Nobody but MS would know why for sure,
but at least one person suspects that it is filled-in by some process
and expected to persist after a reboot.  Or perhaps it is expected to be
populated by a previous process which chains to this point.  The memory
read is at 0x000FAF0.  It appears that this memory location is expected
to be a null-terminated string for an alternative filename for
WINNT.SIF.  If a previous boot-loader has used that memory for something
else, it is filled with garbage, but still used as the alternative
WINNT.SIF filename, which results in failure, of course.  I suspect that
this alternative filename logic is intended to support either a
language-specific alternative filename, or a client/model-specific
filename, to allow for different setup options for different clients.

H. Peter recently addressed this in PXELINUX here:
http://git.kernel.org/?p=boot/syslinux/syslinux.git;a=commit;h=18ca4d8cc
87761c6a5ab763069fad562fec69b59.  It might be worth trying with a
PXELINUX built after that source code change.

You might also enjoy Gianluigi's information at:
http://oss.netfarm.it/guides/ris-linux.php and
http://oss.netfarm.it/guides/pxe.php and
http://oss.netfarm.it/guides/ris-linux.pdf.  You might also search the
Boot-Land forums for relevant discussion.

You might also enjoy the pxechain.com COMBOOT module included with
Syslinux.  You can use it to chain startrom.n12 from PXELINUX, where RIS
lives on a different box than your TFTP box.  Details are in its source
code at Syslinux/modules/pxechain.asm.

Good luck in your PXELINUX-enabled Windows XP RIS adventures!

- Shao Miller

On 2009.08.15 17:06 Thierry Bugier wrote:
> Reproducing the bug
> ========================>
>
> Create in yout tftp root a folder named pxelinux.cfg
> Create pxelinux.cfg/default with thid content
>
>     DEFAULT menu.c32
>
>     TIMEOUT 0
>     PROMPT  0
>
>     MENU TITLE Multiboot
>
>             LABEL Windows XP Home
>                 KERNEL startrom.0
>
>     MENU END
[...]
>
> When you launch your client computer and select "Windows XP Home"
the
> textmode setup will start and stop on the message
> "Le fichier INF j8??j9,,j:??j;??j<??j=??j>??,???? est endommag?
ou
> manquant, sta."
> The filename cannot be reproduced: most of characters are non
> alphanumerics characters. I replaced them by question marks.
> Here is the filename as received by the TFTP server :
> RRQ from 192.168.0.173 filename
> j8?#002j9?#002j:?#002j;?#002j<?#002j=?#002j>?#002j??q<8D
>
> The bug can be reproduced with syslinux strictly later than version 3.75
The same problems with 3.82.
But I have found, that commenting out the line:
DEFAULT menu.c32

causes, that installation is starting correctly.
So it is a problem with VGA mode and not with pxelinux.0 or others.

Maybe it will help.

On 21-08-2009, 12:24, Jacek Kalinski wrote:
> On  20-08-2009, 18:12, H. Peter Anvin wrote:
>
>>>
>>> The same problems with 3.82.
>>>
>>>
>>
>> Please try 3.83-pre6.
>>
>
> Still the same error with j8...j9... file.
3.83-pre9 - the same problem.

Jacek

Hi Jacek,

i am not sure what you are exactly doing, but I had also problems with 
memdisk.
The Problem in my case was, that I transfered the memdisk file via FTP by 
using "FileZilla".

I was searching a long time for the problem, and finally the problem was 
"FileZilla". It damaged my files always when transfering.

If you transfer your memdisk (and other) files via FileZilla, then change 
your ftp-client. Try "WinSCP". For me it works perfectly now, and
memdisk
starts correctly.

Best regards
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Jacek Kalinski" <jacek at dyski.one.pl>
To: "For discussion of Syslinux and tftp-hpa" <syslinux at
zytor.com>
Sent: Tuesday, August 25, 2009 2:03 PM
Subject: Re: [syslinux] Incompatibility using pxelinux 3.80 or later and 
setupldr.exe from windows XP 32 bits

> On 21-08-2009, 12:24, Jacek Kalinski wrote:
>> On  20-08-2009, 18:12, H. Peter Anvin wrote:
>>
>>>>
>>>> The same problems with 3.82.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>> Please try 3.83-pre6.
>>>
>>
>> Still the same error with j8...j9... file.
>
> 3.83-pre9 - the same problem.
>
> Jacek
>
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