Netboot Images on other Volumes

Hi,
I am setting up Netboot images for the first time on Mac OS X Server 10.4.7 and have run into a strange problem.
I have successfully created a Netboot image and can use it when the image is in the /Library/Netboot folder on the Boot volume. The problem I've got is that I want to store the image on another volume on the server, but even when I select the relevant volume in the General pane, the image I want to use doesn't appear in the Images pane...
I have even tried navigating to the Image I want to use in Finder and dropping the Image into the window (the + symbol comes up when I do), but the pane remains annoyingly blank.
Any help you can give me would be appreciated !
n/a Mac OS X (10.4.7)

Paul, in mentioning the "General" pane, I assume you've enabled the non boot volume for sharing images (using the checkbox).
That should cause it to create a folder structure on the volume (/Library/NetBoot/NetBootSP1 most likely), into which you can move the disk image. At this point you may have to refresh or reload the images list [sorry I don't have access to an admin machine at the moment].

Similar Messages

Not Enough Free Space on NetBoot Image Partition

Since the NetBoot server isn't all that popular, I'm going to explain how it works a bit before I get into my problem.
I assume everyone knows how it works on the client end. You choose an image and your Mac boots that image over the network. Quick, easy, painless. It's a cool system. So on the server/admin side…
Every version of OS X Server comes with it's own System Imaging Utility. So lets say you want to make a netboot image with some utilities on it. So you take an external hard drive. Make two partitions on it. On one partition, you set it up to be the netboot image. So you install all of the utilities you want installed. You configure all of the preferences just the way you want them. Set your background image, etc, etc. On the other image, you just do a quick clean plain installation of your OS. And you also install your OS X Server Admin tools (or in case of 10.8, the Server app). So once your image-to-be is configured, you boot the second partition, and run the imaging utility. This utility will turn your volume into a netboot image. A netboot image is basically just a folder with some .plists in it, a read-only disk image of your initial volume, and a kernel or two (10.5).
NetBoot images are read-only. So when you boot them, you can make as many changes as you want. But once you shut down, all changes are lost. Every time any mac boots a netboot image, it is booting the image exactly as it was when you made it. The changes you make are stored in shadow files on the server that you can periodically toss, since they are only used during the current active session. Once you reboot, the shadow files are useless.
So here is the problem: When you make a netboot image from a real volume, the utility only leaves a small amount of free space on the volume. Even though the disk image is read only, the amount of free space matters because that's still all you get to use. In other words, if the .dmg file in the netboot image i just made only has 900 MB of free space in the volume, then that's all I get for free space on any machine I boot off that image. Even though the image is read only, and all of the "free space" is actually being stored as shadow files on the server, that limit is still applied. And 900 MB is not very much free space. So you can boot a utilities volume and if a program eats up a lot of ram, that virtual memory can eat up what little free HD space you have, and suddenly your netboot image is not very functional.
Now being the clever fellow that I am, I came up with a solution to this problem last time around. I used the following command to resize the partition (and only the partition) of the .dmg file, inside the netboot image (netboot images are just folders).
hdiutil resize -size 60g -partitiononly NetBoot.dmg
This resized the volumes to 60 GB. But it was all blank space, so the .dmg file's size did not change. It would just mount as a read only volume with 40 GB of free space instead of a few hundred MB. This little trick worked very well. But it's not working any more. I can't figure out why. But every time I try to run this command on the .dmg file, I get an error very similar to the following:
hdiutil: resize request 125829120 is above maximum size 18005952 allowed.
hdiutil: resize: failed. Invalid argument (22)
I get this error while running 10.8, 10.7, or 10.6. I get this error whether I'm trying to resize an image containing 10.8, 10.7, 10.6, 10.5, 10.4 or 10.3. I get this error whether I convert the image to a read/write image first, or even a spare image first. I get this error whether the original hard drive that volumes were on, is partitioned as APM or GUID.
The "maximum size" listed in the error message is different for each image I try to resize. It's as if the tool is trying to fit the increase volume inside the existing free space of the image's volume. Which isn't what I'm trying to do at all.
I've been using netboot images filled with utilities for years now. And overall it works very very well. I started back when the first macbooks came out with no firewire. I quickly realized I needed a better solution than booting my Mac into firewire mode to repair other Macs. And then when I got into it, I realized I could host images of all different OS versions. So now I can plug my MBP into a client's network, and boot any Mac they have off of a utility volume of any version of Mac OS X needed, all the way down to 10.3, all at the same time. And I also have NetInstall volumes too that let me install OS X for all these versions as well. The only real quirk I've had over the years, is this 'free' space issue. In the past (before the last time I updated my images, where I used the command above to resize the partitions and solve the problem), what I've done when I've ran into a HD pinch while working, is to immediately start deleting apps I don't think I'm going to need, right off the netbooted Mac. This frees up space on the netboot volume and the system is happy. And again it's all read only, so I'm not actually making changes to the image itself. One real half assed solution I thought of was to set up all of my netboot volumes as having a 1 GB file in their trash and not emptying it before creating a netboot image from the volume. Then when this problem came up and the OS was running out of disk space, I could just empty the trash. I'm quite sure this little trick would have worked, but it's so half-assed. I'd much rather just have more free space on the mounted disk images.

But how did my command work so perfectly last time? Here's an image. On the left, the info window of the disk image inside my 10.7 Utilities netboot image. On the right, the info window for that disk image's mounted volume. The file is only 7 GB and the volume is a 30 GB volume with ~23 GB free. None of the free space of the volume is using up any actual disk space in the .dmg file. I did this once, there's got to be a way to reproduce this again?
Here's the same thing with my 10.6 Utilities netboot image. Also in case I'm not being clear, these netboot images these screen shots are of, are from the last time I updated my netboot images ~11 months ago. These are not my current batch that I'm trying to finalize.

NetBoot Images not "seen" by MM / MBA when booting with ALT without any local bootable Volumes

Hello Community!
I ran into a very odd Problem trying to start Production and Service Mac Minis or Mac Book Airs from our NetBoot Server holding the ALT Key while the Startup Chime sounds. Image selection is working fine if a local Volume is present. When no local bootable Volume is available the Macs will (in 90% of the Cases) stop responding at the point where the Bootpicker should show all available NetBoot Volumes. The dropdown menu for choosing a Wireless Network is popping up but after that the spinning wheel next to it stops and the Mac wont recognize any input from mouse or keyboard.
The EFI Startup environment is not totally stuck in these cases though, cause sometimes when you restart the NetBoot Service on the Server the NetBoot Volumes will popup on the clients screen.
If you hold the clients "N" key instead to Start Up from the Servers Default NB Image it works like a charm. Also all the other Mac Models have no problem at all Netbooting using the Bootpicker.
Among other things I already tried the following:
- changing NBI index numbers
- shortening Image names that are sent out by the Server at the BSDP ACK[LIST] step to reduce the packet size
- deactivating all Netboot Images but one
- setting up a second netboot Server and transferring half of the Images to it
the Netboot Log shows that the following client - server communication is repeated over an over:
Oct 10 16:58:47 macimgsrv.intern bootpd[20296]: DHCP INFORM [en0]: 1,10:dd:b1:ea:d1:e5
Oct 10 16:58:47 macimgsrv.intern bootpd[20296]: ACK sent <no hostname> 192.168.2.112 pktsize 300
Oct 10 16:58:48 macimgsrv.intern bootpd[20296]: BSDP INFORM [en0] 1,10:dd:b1:ea:d1:e5 NetBoot1271 arch=i386 sysid=Macmini6,1
Oct 10 16:58:48 macimgsrv.intern bootpd[20296]: NetBoot: [1,10:dd:b1:ea:d1:e5] BSDP ACK[LIST] sent 192.168.2.112 pktsize 364
Oct 10 16:58:48 macimgsrv.intern bootpd[20296]: DHCP INFORM [en0]: 1,10:dd:b1:ea:d1:e5
Oct 10 16:58:48 macimgsrv.intern bootpd[20296]: ACK sent <no hostname> 192.168.2.112 pktsize 300
Oct 10 16:58:53 macimgsrv.intern bootpd[20296]: BSDP INFORM [en0] 1,10:dd:b1:ea:d1:e5 NetBoot1271 arch=i386 sysid=Macmini6,1
Oct 10 16:58:53 macimgsrv.intern bootpd[20296]: NetBoot: [1,10:dd:b1:ea:d1:e5] BSDP ACK[LIST] sent 192.168.2.112 pktsize 364
As a next step I thought of transfering DNS, DHCP and NAT Services to another Machine, although i dont know if that will help.
If you had the same problem or know anything that might help to solve it, i would be very happy if u share your knowledge with me
as i am starting to get insane on this one
thank you in advance,
Colin Andrew

Hello Community!
I ran into a very odd Problem trying to start Production and Service Mac Minis or Mac Book Airs from our NetBoot Server holding the ALT Key while the Startup Chime sounds. Image selection is working fine if a local Volume is present. When no local bootable Volume is available the Macs will (in 90% of the Cases) stop responding at the point where the Bootpicker should show all available NetBoot Volumes. The dropdown menu for choosing a Wireless Network is popping up but after that the spinning wheel next to it stops and the Mac wont recognize any input from mouse or keyboard.
The EFI Startup environment is not totally stuck in these cases though, cause sometimes when you restart the NetBoot Service on the Server the NetBoot Volumes will popup on the clients screen.
If you hold the clients "N" key instead to Start Up from the Servers Default NB Image it works like a charm. Also all the other Mac Models have no problem at all Netbooting using the Bootpicker.
Among other things I already tried the following:
- changing NBI index numbers
- shortening Image names that are sent out by the Server at the BSDP ACK[LIST] step to reduce the packet size
- deactivating all Netboot Images but one
- setting up a second netboot Server and transferring half of the Images to it
the Netboot Log shows that the following client - server communication is repeated over an over:
Oct 10 16:58:47 macimgsrv.intern bootpd[20296]: DHCP INFORM [en0]: 1,10:dd:b1:ea:d1:e5
Oct 10 16:58:47 macimgsrv.intern bootpd[20296]: ACK sent <no hostname> 192.168.2.112 pktsize 300
Oct 10 16:58:48 macimgsrv.intern bootpd[20296]: BSDP INFORM [en0] 1,10:dd:b1:ea:d1:e5 NetBoot1271 arch=i386 sysid=Macmini6,1
Oct 10 16:58:48 macimgsrv.intern bootpd[20296]: NetBoot: [1,10:dd:b1:ea:d1:e5] BSDP ACK[LIST] sent 192.168.2.112 pktsize 364
Oct 10 16:58:48 macimgsrv.intern bootpd[20296]: DHCP INFORM [en0]: 1,10:dd:b1:ea:d1:e5
Oct 10 16:58:48 macimgsrv.intern bootpd[20296]: ACK sent <no hostname> 192.168.2.112 pktsize 300
Oct 10 16:58:53 macimgsrv.intern bootpd[20296]: BSDP INFORM [en0] 1,10:dd:b1:ea:d1:e5 NetBoot1271 arch=i386 sysid=Macmini6,1
Oct 10 16:58:53 macimgsrv.intern bootpd[20296]: NetBoot: [1,10:dd:b1:ea:d1:e5] BSDP ACK[LIST] sent 192.168.2.112 pktsize 364
As a next step I thought of transfering DNS, DHCP and NAT Services to another Machine, although i dont know if that will help.
If you had the same problem or know anything that might help to solve it, i would be very happy if u share your knowledge with me
as i am starting to get insane on this one
thank you in advance,
Colin Andrew

System Image Utility 10.6.3 - fails when creating NetBoot image from DVD

System Image Utility 10.6.3, trying to create a NetBoot image from a bundled installer disc that came with a 27" Late 2009 iMac (iMac11,1). Image creation fails consistently, since the image that System Image Utility creates is only 901M.
Anyone see this before?
Don
--------- System Image Utility log ----------
Workflow Started (2010-06-16 14:03:02 -0700)
Starting action: Define Image Source
Finished running action: Define Image Source
Starting action: Create Image
Starting image creation process...
Create NetBoot Image
Initiating NetBoot from Install Media.
Creating working path at /Library/NetBoot/NetBootSP0/NetBoot of Mac OS X Install DVD
Creating disk image (Size: 901 MB)
Finalizing disk image.
created: /Library/NetBoot/NetBootSP0/NetBoot of Mac OS X Install DVD/NetBoot.dmg
Attaching disk image
Installing to destination volume
2010-06-16 14:03:38.126 installer[2365:6f03] Looking for system packages
2010-06-16 14:03:38.129 installer[2365:6f03] no system packages found
2010-06-16 14:03:38.130 installer[2365:6f03] No or Invalid system receipts found on /private/tmp/mnt.LjFArn
2010-06-16 14:03:38.130 installer[2365:6f03] Attempting fallback using: /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/SystemMigration.framework/Resources/FallbackS ystemFiles.plist
2010-06-16 14:03:38.175 installer[2365:6f03] Finding system files...
2010-06-16 14:03:38.619 installer[2365:6f03] Writing system path cache.
2010-06-16 14:03:38.623 installer[2365:6f03] Error writing cache to /private/tmp/mnt.LjFArn/Library/Caches/com.apple.FindSystemFiles.plist
2010-06-16 14:03:38.625 installer[2365:6f03] Failed to enumerate /tmp/mnt.LjFArn/Library/Caches, cannot prune (
"com.apple.userpictureCache"
installer: Package name is Mac OS X
installer: Installing at base path /private/tmp/mnt.LjFArn
installer: The install failed (There is not enough space on this disk to install the selected items. Deselect at least 6.46 GB and try again.)
Script is done.
NetBoot creation failed.
Image creation process finished...
Stopping image creation.
Image creation failed.

Brian Nesse wrote:
Hi Don, here's my guess...
The 901 number is additional space added in the scripts. This indicates that the source image size was 0.
Since you are making a NetBoot from Install media, under the covers the installer process is being run to create a NetBoot volume. The media shipped with the 27" iMac is most likely CPU specific and thus the installation fails because you are trying to create the image (i.e. install the system) on an unsupported CPU.
In order to produce a NetBoot from the install media, you'll have to create it on the 27" iMac.
Hi Brian,
Thanks for the response. This makes perfect sense. I'll give this a try and shout back!
Thanks,
Don

NetBoot images are not showing up in the Startup Disk window

I have created a few Netboot images, enabled them and placed them in the correct place.
They don't show up in the Startup Disk window.
I have noticed that bootparamd is not running, and that after a while also bootpd disappeared.
Strange, no?
(I started them back up and it didn't make a difference.)
Message was edited by: marc herman

It looks like the NFS exports has separate entries for both:
/Volumes/xxxxx
/Volumes/xxxxx/Library/NetBoot/NetBootSP0
and that's not allowed. You can't separately export a directory and one of its subdirectories on the same file system.
It sounds like maybe the Server Admin tools are confused. If you don't really need /Volumes/xxxxx exported, then I think just deleting that share should fix things up.
If you can't get the tools to straighten things out, you could override all the NFS exports with your own defined in /etc/exports. There's an exports(5) man page that describes the format and creating an /etc/exports file will override anything in NetInfo (10.4 and earlier).
If you want to export both directories, they just need to be listed in the same exports entry, like:
/Volumes/xxxxx /Volumes/xxxxx/Library/NetBoot/NetBootSP0
This causes the "/Volumes/xxxxx" file system to be exported and allows only the directories "/Volumes/xxxxx" and "/Volumes/xxxxx/Library/NetBoot/NetBootSP0" to be mounted.
HTH
--macko

Odd Problem Making 10.6.3 NetBoot Image

I have netboot volumes for 10.3, 10.4 and 10.5. They all have some useful utilities on them, and any time I need to fix any Mac, brand new or very old, I just boot the appropriate netboot image (and usually run diskwarrior). Overall it's worked very effectively. I just whipped up my first 10.6 netboot image. I do them all the same way, I install OS X on a firewire drive, then I install everything I want on it. Set all my preferences exactly the way I want them. Then I use the System Image Utility to turn it into a NetBoot image. So this 10.6.3 image boot perfectly off the firewire drive every single time. But every time I turn it into a netboot image and boot off of it (from any mac), I get this odd font error at startup:
http://img405.imageshack.us/img405/1858/screenshot20100418at125.png
I haven't touched any fonts. I haven't installed any graphics related software at all. Just utilities, and openoffice. And like I said... this volume boots perfect as a firewire drive. It's when you convert it to a netboot image and boot it, it gives you this strange error at boot. Any ideas what the deal is? Yes I am making the .nbi folder on 10.6 server. It should just work

This solution came from a conglomeration of the posts here and I was able to repeat my results. To make the error go away, boot your source into target mode and after connecting it to your image creation machine (OSX Server in my case) remove all the directories/folders in /private/var/folders; mine were named zz, t9, and 43. I tried doing this before booting into target mode but they get re-created immediately so they never really go away. Hope this helps someone.

Error creating a netboot image with System Image Utility

Hi all !
I am trying to create a NetBoot image from my Panther CD, to boot an old iBook.
I am using System Image Utility version 10.4.11.
I can create a NetInstall image, but when I create a NetBoot image SIU give me an error.
I looked in the logs and I can see the error is generated by the script Applications/Server/System Image Utility.app/Contents/Resources/.preinstall
This command is the culprit:
/usr/sbin/installer -verbose -lang 'eng' -pkg '/Volumes/Mac OS X Install Disc 1/System/Installation/Packages/OSInstall.mpkg' -target /Library/NetBoot/NetBootSP0/PantBoot3.nbi/mnt -_multiDiscPath /tmp/siuInstallExtras
The error is (as seen in the logs):
This package requires authentication to install.
If I take the command and run it in the terminal using sudo it goes thru, but gives another error:
installer: Cannot install on volume /Library/NetBoot/NetBootSP0/PantBoot3.nbi/mnt because it is disabled.
installer: Mac OS X cannot start up from this volume.
Is this thing supposed to work ?? It seems to me SIU is buggy.
Any help would be much appreciated.
Regards
Mike

I'm not digging the new SIU at all yet. Maybe I'll get used to it in time. I couldn't get it to accept a Tiger 10.4.6 Install disc the other day to build a NetInstall. Don't know if I was doing something wrong or if it was instinctively rejecting it because I was doing something unsupported.
I miss NetRestore. I think Mike wants use to use Automator... but I want NetRestore's automated Multicast ASR and Windows image restore. It would take a lot of work to match Mike's shrink-wrapped solution.
Speaking of NetRestore, its creator Mike Bombich advises against use CCC for mass deployment. This may include what you're doing. It's really a backup tool, but unfortunately a lot of people got into the habit of using it for creating deployment images and these often have problems. It's the best tool for create images that you will deploy onto multiple Macs.

Help creating a netboot image for Panther in SIU

Hi!
I have an old iBook G3 that has a broken CDROM drive.
I want to install Panther on it, so I'm thinking to netboot it from my SNow Leopard server.
I tried creating a netboot image from the original Panther CD, using the System Image Utility in SL but it seems I can only create images of Snow Leopard.
This limitation seems strange.
Is there a way to create a netboot image from my Panther CD and use it to beet my ibook ?
Any information online on how to achieve this?
Thanks
Mike

Thanks Antonio !
That's a really good answer.
I just need to add some more info:
I downloaded the Server Admin tools from the link you gave me but it would not install on 10.6.1 Server nor on 10.5 client.
I get the error:
"You cannot install Server Admin Tools on this volume. You are not allowed to install the software on this disk for an unknown reason."
Thus I extracted manually the System Image Utility from Installers/Packages/ServerAdminTools.pkg/Contents/Archive.pax.gz
The application runs fine on Leopard client and SL server.
I just need to figure out now how to boot my iBook.

NetBoot image reports errors in Disk utility

I am running all the latest greatest updates to Tiger Server. I have setup a computer just for NetBoots. I created the images properly. I can boot the images with no issue. The images were created as troubleshooting boot volumes instead of using physical hards drives when trouble comes up. When I open Disk Utility while booted in the NetBoot image, choose to Verify the actual physical disk within the computer that has problems, I get the message "Verify volume failed with error Could not unmount disk." The same message is given when you attempt to repair the disk as well, however it says Repair volume. At any rate, I have booted a known good computer and used Disk Utility on the good computer, and the same error message is given. My assumption is that I can boot via the network to a known good system, and then repair hard drives that need repair. It should work right"?
None Mac OS X (10.4.7) Tiger Server 10.4.

Is the Netboot image 'diskless'? If it isn't, the Netboot image is using the local Hard Drive to save some of the image's preferences that are always in use by the Operating System.

Why can only some machines see netboot images at the startup screen?

I have a 10.6.6 server running as a netboot server. I have about 10 images running on the server that consist of a 10.6.6 and 10.5.8 triage partition and a 10.6.6 and 10.5.8 restore image. Now what I have noticed is that newer machines after starting up and holding down the option key will see all the available images.But on some older intel machines nothing will show up after holding the option key down accept the internal drive itself, But if you hold down the N key it WILL boot to the default image.
I have made sure and checked that the ethernet port was working on the older machines. I also made sure that I can see the images from the startup control panel. All machines can see the netboot images from the startup control panel, but older intel versions cant. However I was able to sometimes get the old white and black macbooks to see the images but others not.
Any suggestions as to why some machines will see the images at the startup screen after holding the option key and why some wont?

That, most likely, means that you have a fairly large number of images and/or they have very long names.
The number of images that can be displayed is limited by the size of the data packet which contains the NetBoot volume information. Two techniques we use to keep this in check are 1) aggressive purging of outdated images, and 2) use of shorter display names (the one seen in Startup Disk, not the one in the NetBootSP0 folder).

Software Update on existing NetBoot image

Hello
I have a 10.5.1 NetBoot image made from DVD, which I want to update it to 10.5.3. How can I do that?
Or do I have to recreate it?
Thanks in advance
K.

You'll have to re-create it. As far as I know, there is no way to target a non-booted volume with software update.

Modify Netboot Image

Is there a way for me to modify my netboot image without having to recreate and or repackage my nbi???

Justin Andrews wrote:
A default NetBoot.dmg disk image is read-only. Not writable. You'd have to convert the disk image to read/write and try to convert it back to read-only when you move it back to the original location.
Not according to disk utility...
bnesse6:~ brian$ hdiutil imageinfo /Volumes/Stripe/Library/NetBoot/NetBootSP1/NetBoot\ of\ 10.5.6\ $9G55$\ Install.nbi/NetBoot.dmg
Format: UDRW
Backing Store Information:
Name: NetBoot.dmg
URL: file://localhost/Volumes/Stripe/Library/NetBoot/NetBootSP1/NetBoot%20of%2010.5.6 %20(9G55)%20Install.nbi/NetBoot.dmg
Class Name: CBSDBackingStore
Format Description: raw read/write
Checksum Type: none
partitions:
The only images which are read only by default are NetInstall from volume images, as they are processed for restore by ASR.

My time machine does not want to save any more the data from my powerbook 13" Snow Leopard; i get the message "Time Machine could not suppress the disk image of saving "Volumes/Time Capsule Disk/PowerBook _2011_03_21_123627 sparsebundle" What should I do?

My time machine does not want to save any more the data from my powerbook 13" Snow Leopard; i get the message "Time Machine could not suppress the disk image of saving "Volumes/Time Capsule Disk/PowerBook _2011_03_21_123627 sparsebundle" What is the problem? What should I do?
Thanks !!
Alain

Could that read " . . . could not access . . ."? If so, try repairing your backups, per #A5 in Time Machine - Troubleshooting.
If not, or if that doesn't help, see #A1 there. Use the TM Buddy widget it details to copy and post the messages here.

NetBoot Images Not Recognized by Server

I can use SIU to create NetBoot images from my install package just fine. They end up in the Library/NetBoot/NetbootSP0 directory. But the Server NetInstall images pane tells me that "No images available" regardless of where I place them. The client sharepoints are available in the File Share service. I've followed the instructions from multiple sources (the all say essentially the same thing) to no avail.
Now I'm just stuck. This should be working, but I can't figure out what I'm missing.

I'm not sure if I am answering the correct question or not...
And my experience was on 10.6.8 server, with NetRestore rather than NetBoot. Nevertheless I'll mention what I found in case it is helpful as they are very nearly the same process.
I had awful problems in the past getting the whole process to work, it seems that it matters which machine you use to do the imaging. What I found worked was to:
- clone the disc you want to image onto a USB disc. I can't remember what I used to do this, would have been either ditto or SuperDuper! (I found in the past that CarbonCopy Cloner worked less well)
- plug the USB disc into the server and run Disk Image Utility on the server
For me this was the "Eureka" moment that made the whole thing suddenly work.
Also I should mention that I found that it matters which network switch you use. A TPLink switch didn't pass something that was needed for the NetRestore process to work, whereas an HP Procurve switch worked fine.
HTH

How can I create a NetBoot image using command line tools?

Is it possible to create a NetBoot image entirely using command line tools?
(That is, without using the SystemImageUtility)
If so, are there reasonable instructions posted somewhere?
I don't believe I can use SystemImageUtility with my current setup,
but I would be happy to hear how I could:
I have a set of Xserve clusternodes but without optical drives or video cards.
One node acts as the head, running DHCP, DNS, OpenDirectory, Xgrid.
They are wired to a gigabit switch.
I have a PowerBook connected on the subnet which has ServerAdmin Tools installed.
I don't think when I run SystemImageUtility on my PowerBook that I can successfully image one of the clusternodes disks over the network.
I have tried to start one node in target(Firewire) mode, connect it via Firewire
to the head node, and run hdiutil from the head node to make a complete disk image of the clusternode's drive.
But a NetBoot image requires the whole nbi file, right?
Could I then use copy this disk image to my PowerBook and use SystemImageUtility on my PowerBook to create a NetBoot image from it?
I really have tried to read the PDFs, but I found the section on System Imaging in the Command Line Reference rather unhelpful.
Thanks for anyones help.
dmaus
Mac OS X (10.4.4)

To create a NetBoot image, you could just put the cluster node in target mode and attach it to your PowerBook. Then use SIU to create the NetBoot image.
If you're trying to create a backup image of the disk, use hdiutil, or put in in target mode and create the image with Disk Utility.

Netboot Images on other Volumes

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