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ConfigMgr

ConfigMgr : PXE-booting legacy BIOS and UEFI

In testing Surface Pro 2 deployment via ConfigMgr I ran into an issue where no matter what I tried the device would not PXE boot. I was using the official Ethernet USB adapter and all of our existing device portfolio were able to PXE boot without issue.

I then discovered the following article: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2602043/EN-US

To summarise, in a mixed environment, which is likely to represent most, you’ll find that trying to PXE boot a UEFI client with DHCP options 66/67 set will fail.

This is because the boot programs differ:

  • Legacy BIOS: wdsnbp.com
  • UEFI: wdsmgfw.efi

The *only* way you can achieve this cross-subnet/VLAN is to define IP-Helper addresses on your network infrastructure, adding entries for the PXE boot servers. Once this is completed remove the DHCP scope/server options and you’ll find that both legacy BIOS and UEFI machines can PXE boot.

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