Windows server 2012 R2 PXE boot is unworkable slow, I have this exact same set-up working in 2008 R2 What can I do?

Question

Hi there
I'm trying to deploy a windows 7 image through Windows deployment services via PXE boot from a 2012 R2 server.
Issue:    PXE boot is extremely slow, it takes up to more than 60 minutes for the device to download download the PXE boot
Things I already tried to get this up and running:
I've tried to change the TFTP block size via command prompt and via regedit
I've changed the settings on the tab of the WDS role (go to WDS role -> properties on server -> Tab "tftp")
Both actions resulted in PXE boot being even slower than it already was.
To make sure this is not because of our environment I’ve set up the same configuration on a windows server 2008 R2, here PXE boot image is downloaded to the machine within 3 minutes.
Both servers are set up through Hyper-V this is the configuration:
2008 R2:
Memory: 4096 MB
1 Virtual processor
IDE controller 2 hard drives
Network adapter
2012 R2:
Memory: 4096 MB
32 virtual processors
SCSI controller 2 hard drives
Network adapter
I can’t imagine that PXE boot is not working because of the differences of the Hard drives controllers or because of the amount of the virtual processors.
Windows server 2012 R2 seems to handle PXE boot TFTP differently in comparison to 2008 R2.
Do you guys know what I can do/try to get this working?

Answer 1

Hi Jacques Rodrigues,
You can run Windows Deployment Services on Hyper-V virtual machines,
that the performance will often be degraded, particularly during the Trivial File Transfer Protocol (TFTP) download phase. This phase is very resource-intensive and may
fail if insufficient resources are available on your server running Hyper-V.
If you are using multicast, Check if IGMP Snooping is enabled i.e. Routers that support multicasting. In particular, Internet Group Membership Protocol (IGMP) snooping should
be enabled on all devices. This will cause your network hardware to forward multicast packets only to those devices that are requesting data. If IGMP snooping is turned off, multicast packets are treated as broadcast packets, and will be sent to every device
in the subnet.
The related KB:
Windows Deployment Services Overview
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/hh831764.aspx
I’m glad to be of help to you!
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