Altiris PXE Server doesn't work properly after migrating to ESX 3.01

[StPi]

Hi there,

we run an Altiris Deployment Solution 6.5 which is installed in a VM.

It worked flawlessly in our ESX 2.52 environment for several months now.

After migrating the VM to our new ESX 3.01 Server the deployment of new workstations fail during the Windows' setup copy process. The setup reports a read error and even after a retry the setup fails in the end.

We already moved the vm to another ESX 3.01 server without any effect.

I switched the NICs of the vSwitch to 1000 FD instead of autodetect - no effect.

Our switches show no errors at all on the ports.

We now restored a backup to our old ESX 2.52 environment and everything works fine again!?

Does anyone have a hint???

Kind regards,

Stefan

[StPi]

Hmm, just tried to but I can't change the type of the network adapter.

I think I'll delete the NIC and then recreate it.

Will take some time, I'll let you know!

[VirtualKenneth]

Rather strange... no teaming on the vSwitch that is connected for the VM's?

[StPi]

The vSwitch is connected to two NICs but we already tried it with only one NIC - without success.

[VirtualKenneth]

Odd, and what happens if you create a distribution share with

1) loads of small files

2) a few huge files

and copy these over exactly the same as the source gets copied over?

[StPi]

Well, we already tried to copy several files from the server to a workstation and that worked.

I can't try right now because we had to get the server working again and so we restored it to our old ESX 2.52 for now.

I'll see if I can down the server tomorrow and will then try the following in the ESX 3.01 environment:

\- copy a large amount of small files

\- copy large files

\- delete the NIC and recreate it, then try Altiris deployment again

Any further suggestions what I could/should try?

[VirtualKenneth]

yeah, another suggestion is to read this: http://www.vmware.com/community/help.jspa#awardrp

If you found some helpful tips so far

[StPi]

SUCCESS!!!

It seems to work now!

I deleted the NIC (vmxnet) that has been taken over from ESX 2.52 during migration.

I then added a new NIC (flexible).

The first tries were successful now. We'll see how it behaves in the next days but I'm pretty confident.

Thanks for your help, especially Cheeko for the important hint!

Best regards,

Stefan

[StPi]

Unfortunatley it doesn't work anymore

During my holidays a colleague of mine had a problem and reinstalled VMware tools. Now we have the same problem again.

Deleting and reinstalling NIC doesn't help.

I installed the latest ESX patches and updated VMware tools - without success.

Any ideas what to do?

Does anyone else use an Altiris Deployment server within a VI3 virtual machine?

Kind regards,

Stefan

[schnj65]

Unfortunatley it doesn't work anymore

During my holidays a colleague of mine had a problem

and reinstalled VMware tools. Now we have the same

problem again.

Deleting and reinstalling NIC doesn't help.

I installed the latest ESX patches and updated VMware

tools - without success.

Any ideas what to do?

Does anyone else use an Altiris Deployment server

within a VI3 virtual machine?

Kind regards,

Stefan

we are also using the Altiris Deployment server in a Windows 2003 VM. Host VMware server is ESX 3.0.1. A few days ago I P2V3'd physical Dell 2850 Altiris server to a Windows 2003 Ent Guest VM. It seemed to work ok for almost 2 days and then all sorts of imaging issues

We are having very similar problems - we are receiving decompression errors when trying to image a new XP workstations (Ghost Image on Altiris server) - it physical workstation makes it through the PXE boot and connects to the Altiris deployment server VM. It starts to image the PC and generally gets to about 13 % and errors out with a Symantec Ghost errror - "ERROR "19235 -- Decompression error -3" or a -5"

We had seen this problem once before on our Physical Altiris server (Dell 2850 server). We resolved it by using an add-in Intel Gig NIC (we had been using the integrated Dell Broadcom Gig NIC's). Our switches are Cisco 6509's

the vSwitch is configured with multiple Intel Phy-NIC's - all connected to Trunked Cisco GIG ports - AutoNeg on. vSwitch port group is configured for a specific Cisco VLAN.

we are seriously considering going back to the physical server. I have seen other discussions that question whether or not to even virtualize an altiris deployment server - we service approximately 2000 workstations

[Rumple]

We have had 2 different Virtual DS servers running in 3.01 without any issues deploying images to physical desktops although I've run into some seriious performance issues running the DOS PXE boot disk deplying to VM's...

One DS was a migrated one and the other was a fresh build.