Résultats de recherche pour « having fun with starwind »

Résultats de recherche : having fun with starwind

Having fun with StarWind Virtual SAN Free and differencing virtual disks : article #3

Nov 022018

See previous article to understand why and what.

Previously we have created our differencing / child disks.

Lets first set our iscsi target with Starwind San Free by creating two targets and attaching one disk in each target.

Then lets boot our diskless computers over the network with TinyPXE Server.

We will use the below ipxe scripts (one for each network booting computer).
Replace ‘X’ below with the target number (1 or 2) on line 3 and 5.

#!ipxe
clear net0.dhcp/gateway:ipv4
set initiator-iqn iqn.2006-11.X
set keep-san 1
sanboot --keep iscsi:${next-server}:tcp:3260:0:iqn.2008-08.com.starwindsoftware:erwan-pc2-childX

And here we go, we have X diskless computers booted over the network using differencing disks on the iscsi target.

Having fun with StarWind Virtual SAN Free and differencing virtual disks : article #2

Boot, iscsi, network, PXE 1 Response »

Nov 022018

See previous article to understand why and what.

Previously we have created our master / parent disk.

Lets now create our differencing / child disks using our host (windows 8.1) virtual disk capabilities.

Lets do it in one batch.

rem list disks before vmount disks rem create child1 against parent iscsi.vhd vmount createchild e:\_images\child1.vhd e:\_images\iscsi.vhd rem create child2 against parent iscsi.vhd vmount createchild e:\_images\child2.vhd e:\_images\iscsi.vhd rem attach child1 without assigning any letter to it vmount attach e:\_images\child1.vhd noletter rem attach child2 without assigning any letter to it vmount attach e:\_images\child2.vhd noletter rem list disks vmount disks rem check attributes of disk2 vmount attributes 2 rem check attributes of disk3 vmount attributes 3 rem disk3 is most probably offline because of disk signature collision between disk2 and disk3 rem lets force it online : windows will generate a new signature rem make sure to use a BCD using LOCATE and not using disk signature or else bootmgr will error rem more about locate here http://www.mistyprojects.co.uk/documents/BCDEdit/files/device_locate.htm vmount online 3

Notice how the second virtual disk now has a different signature (since we forced it online…).

Having fun with StarWind Virtual SAN Free and differencing virtual disks : article #1

Boot, iscsi, TinyPXE Server, WinPE 1 Response »

Nov 022018

See previous article to understand why and what.

In this article, we will see how to create our master / parent VHD and how to install windows onto this disk.

To manipulate virtual hard disks on the command line, i use vmount.

Create parent vhd
vmount createdynamic e:\_images\iscsi.vhd 102400
Attach vhd as physical disk without a drive letter
vmount attach e:\_images\iscsi.vhd NOLETTER
Check it out
vmount disks

At this stage, we have a new \\.\physicaldriveX on your host which we can use within our iscsi target (using Starwind San Free).

Last step, lets boot our diskless computer to install windows.
To do this, I will use TinyPXE Server and iPxe.
I also use QuickPE to customize my winpe (but default ms waik or adk will do as well).

First boot : we will attach our iscsi disk then boot our WinPE from where we will launch windows setup (over a network share)

#!ipxe #dhcp net0 clear net0.dhcp/gateway:ipv4 set keep-san 1 sanhook iscsi:${next-server}:tcp:3260:0:iqn.2008-08.com.starwindsoftware:erwan-pc2-master set boot-url http://${dhcp-server} echo ${platform}_${buildarch} kernel ${boot-url}/wimboot iseq ${platform} pcbios && initrd -n bootmgr.exe ${boot-url}/BOOTMGR.EXE bootmgr.exe || iseq ${platform} efi && initrd -n bootmgfw.efi ${boot-url}/bootmgfw.EFI bootmgfw.efi || iseq ${platform} pcbios && initrd -n bcd ${boot-url}/BOOT/BCD bcd || iseq ${platform} efi && initrd -n bcd ${boot-url}/EFI/MICROSOFT/BOOT/BCD bcd || initrd ${boot-url}/BOOT/BOOT.SDI BOOT.SDI iseq ${platform} pcbios && initrd -n boot.wim ${boot-url}/SOURCES/x86/BOOT.WIM BOOT.WIM || iseq ${platform} efi && initrd -n boot.wim ${boot-url}/SOURCES/x64/BOOT.WIM BOOT.WIM || boot

Second boot : lets boot to complete the windows installation

#!ipxe #dhcp clear net0.dhcp/gateway:ipv4 set initiator-iqn iqn.2006-11.1 set keep-san 1 sanboot --keep iscsi:${next-server}:tcp:3260:0:iqn.2008-08.com.starwindsoftware:erwan-pc2-master

Having fun with StarWind Virtual SAN Free and differencing virtual disks

Uncategorized 4 Responses »

Nov 022018

Windows server iscsi target is a nice product allowing one to boot diskless computers over the network (using iscsi).

Furthermore, windows iscsi target supports differencing virtual hard disks (vhd) allowing one to build a « master » (parent) disk and then create differencing disks thus leaving the master disk untouched.

But you dont always have a windows server at hand and you may wish to go for a cheaper alternative, or just do it another way for fun 🙂

The next 3 articles will take you on a journey to achieve the above i.e boot diskless computers over the network (using StarWind San Free and TinyPXE Server) with differencing virtual hard disks:

–create the master / parent disk
–create the differencing / child disks
–boot diskless computers over the network using these child disks