This guide provides an easy and relatively quick way to PXE boot windows which means you can install Windows over the network with PXE without the need for a CD drive. While the previous guide allows you to slip stream updates and add extra programs it took a LONG LONG time to do, especially with all the downloads it needed to do, this one just installs a vanilla XP, nice and simple, and a lot quicker

Changelog

2008-05-26 – Initial article published
2010-06-22 – Updated last stage with instructions for injecting NIC drivers courtesy of Maarten

Step 1: Getting started.

What you’ll need:

1. Windows 2000/XP CD (to get the i386 directory off it)
2. PC running 2000/XP (to act as a server)
3. Laptop capable of booting over PXE (such as the L400).
4. Tftpd32
   
5. Bart Network Boot Disk
6. SMARTDRV.EXE
7. A Share. The Server must be able to share files (any Microsoft Windows computer can).
8. Working router or plain crossover cable.

Once you’ve collected all of the above, lets begin;

1. Create a share, for the sake of argument create it at c:\WINSTALL
2. Copy your i386 folder and SMARTDRV.EXE into this folder
3. Make a note of your computer name/host name, you can find this out by right clicking on “My Computer”, going to properties, go to “Computer Name” tab, look under Full computer name, in my example, the computers name is STAR, i believe the name needs to be 12 chars or less for this to work in dos mode, so if its longer change it and reboot.



4. Create a folder to PXE boot from, c:\OUTPUT

Downloads
Note: There is a file embedded within this post, please visit this post to download the file.

Step 1: Getting started.

What you’ll need:

1. The Server – Any PC running 2000/XP
2. The Source – Windows 2000/XP CD (we need to get the i386 directory)
3. The Client – Laptop capable of booting over PXE (such as the L400).
4. Tftpd32
   
5. SysAngel DVD Generator here or if you already have .NET framework 1.1.4322 or higher you can get the self extractible here
6. A Share. The Server must be able to share files (any Microsoft Windows computer can).
7. Working router or plain crossover cable.

Once you’ve collected all of the above, do the below:

1. Download and install latest DVD Generator. It’s a single EXE, double-clicking it will install / upgrade it.
2. Create a C:\OUTPUT directory to store the necessary files for your RIS Service. (There should be at least 600 Mo of free space on the selected drive, but it could be as big as 5 or 6 Go if you choose to download every available software.)
3. Share the C:\OUTPUT directory, according Read rights to everyone. Let’s keep the default share name (OUTPUT).

Downloading necessary sources using the DVD Generator.

1. Launch the SysAngel DVD Generator.
2. In the “1. Select your output folder” textbox, enter C:\OUTPUT.
3. In the “2. Indicate your Windows XP source”, browse to the i386 directory of the Windows XP you want to deploy.
4. In the “4. Enter Windows Serial number” textbox, you may provide a serial but this is optional.
5. Now, click the “5. Generate the SYSANGEL DVD ISO” button. Of course, we don’t really need the ISO image that will be generated, but we do need the software to download or update files used to generate the ISO. We also need the DVD Generator to prepare the Windows release.
6. When everything is done, click the “Finished the custom. Generate the ISO!” button and wait… until you get to the final screen :
7. The C:\OUTPUT folder should be all right. If you want to install Windows with a bootable DVD at a later date, burn the ISO (C:\OUTPUT\DVD.iso). Else, you can simply delete this file.
8. If DVD Generator fails to burn the DVD.iso try using your favourite burning software, you can now close the DVD Generator.

Introduction

PXE (Preboot Execution Environment) is not something new, but not often used by home users, as installing an operating system by CD/DVD or USB storage is generally easier, if however you have none of those, your only real option is to network boot (Assuming you have a network port and access to the internet).

The Problem

I bought my sister a cheap laptop from ebay for her birthday, shes not a power user so i picked up a Dell L400 for £100, its only got a 700MHz processor in it and 256MB of RAM, but for general web browsing it will suit her, however, its a sub notebook, and so doesnt come with a cd drive, nor can it boot from a usb cd drive (took me about half an hour to find that out), so in the end my only real option was to netboot it.

Step 1: Prerequisites

1. Get a copy of the free TFTP server by Philippe Jounin.
2. Get the ubuntu installer files. Download the folder netboot (ignore any symlinks, they may give you errors during the download).

That’s all we need to boot our Ubuntu installer over the network. Let’s setup the TFTP server.

Step 2: Setting up a TFTP Server.

1. Create a directory, preferably on your C Drive. We’ll name it tftp for now.
2. copy the tftpd32.exe to c:tftp
3. Start the server by clicking on the exe
4. switch to the tab “DHCP Server” and fill in your network setup. Note that the PC you want to boot must be in the same Subnet. Enter pxelinux.0 as the boot file. The Screenshot below shows my setup.

Now we need to copy the Ubuntu netboot installer over to our tftp root directory:

1. copy the folder ubuntu-installer to c:tftp
2. copy the folder pxelinux.cfg from ubuntu-installer/i386/ to c:tftp
3. copy the file pxelinux.0 from ubuntu-installer/i386/ to c:tftp

Step 3: Booting Ubuntu

To boot from tftp you may need to activate booting from the network interface in the BIOS. This may be done in the boot sequence settings or directly in the onboard ethernet device settings. After that, restart, lean back and watch the activities in the log viewer tab of the tftpd.
Note: Ubuntu will let you choose a mirror and download all the files you need. The whole procedure will work with any other debian flavour almost identically. There is a nice how to on doing a PXE install via Linux instead of windows at the CCC Wiki.

Note: this is a slightly modified version of the post from Retro at http://hugi.to/blog/archive/2006/12/23/ubuntu-pxe-install-via-windows

The following situations will make the job much easier for you:

* You have physical access to the servers. If you mess up the network connection may cease to function.

* The servers are behind a NAT. You’ll have better control over the actual network configuration in case you need to change it.

Before you start working on the servers:
It’s best to go ahead and set aside a unique, unused IP address for the new cluster and even map a DNS name to that IP. Your job will go a lot smoother.

On Server #1:
Open the properties sheet of the network connection you wish to bind to the cluster. On this sheet you’ll find the services and protocols enabled on this connection, such as TCP/IP. In this list you should find Network Load Balancing unchecked. To set up the cluster you must check the box beside Network Load Balancing and click the Properties button.

On this dialog you will enter the IP address, subnet mask and DNS name of the cluster. (This IP will be added to all the servers later in addition to their own unique IP addresses.) Be sure to click the “Multicast” radio button in “Cluster operation mode”. This saves bandwidth and provides for better expandability. You need not enable remote control; you can use the NLB Manager from the Server 2003 Administration Tools Pack.

Click the “Host Parameters” tab. Since this is the first server, leave its unique host identifier as 1. For any additional servers you configure for the cluster, you will need to increment this. In the dedicated IP configuration, enter the server’s existing static IP address and subnet mask. You can leave everything else in this tab alone.

Next you need to define the port rules. This is important; if you just want to balance load among webservers you should only configure it to do just that. For example: you wouldn’t want to open a Remote Deskop session to one server only to find the connection was rerouted to another. (Assuming you would connect to the cluster IP for Remote Desktop and not use the servers’ unique IP addresses.) If you want to balance everything you can leave the default rule. If not, remove the default rule and add a new one. In this dialog you can select which protocols/ports you want to balance. The configuration in the rest of this tab will work out-of-the-box; if you need a more advanced configuration I suggest you not read a “quickstart” article such as this. After you’re finished with the port rules you can click OK on the NLB property sheet. This should return you to the network connection’s property box.

Your final step on the server is to add the cluster’s IP address to the TCP/IP configuration. Click the TCP/IP protocol and click Properties. From there, click “Advanced” and you’ll get another dialog. On top of this tab you will see the IP addresses assigned to the server. In most cases there will only be one, the server’s existing static IP. Under this list there’s a button to add a new address. Click it and add the cluster’s IP address and subnet mask. Click OK until you have exited all dialog boxes, and you’re finished with the first server! The network connection may die for a moment but it will come back up assuming you did everything right.

Repeat these steps for any additional servers you may want to add to your cluster. You can add up to 32 servers. Just remember to increment the unique host identifier on each server you add. Also keep in mind that all servers must have identical port rules or they will not be accepted into the cluster.

DRM is used in a number of media, but is most commonly found in video and music files. There are many who argue that DRM is a misnomer, since it deals with use issues rather than the rights of the consumer. They therefore reinterpret DRM to stand for Digital Restrictions Management. – wisegeek.

The problem with DRM is it doesnt allow for Fair Use, if you buy something, you should be allowed to use it as your needs require, so here is a guide on how to remove DRM from .wmv files, in order that you can use it in accordance with Fair Use policies. For this to work you MUST have already aquired the licence for the media, this isnt a guide on how to crack DRM, only on how to remove it from files you have licences for.

1) An up to date version of Windows Media Player will NOT work for this, my suggestion is to use VMWare, create a new XP Pro SP2 Virtual Machine with the default WMP9, otherwise you will need to rollback to at the latest 10.00.00.3646, however 9 is probably easier.

2) You need 2 files drmdbg.exe (or drmdbg[1].exe) and drm2wmv_e.exe which can be found here, save them both to the desktop (this is the easiest way to do this).

3) Run drmdbg.exe, when WMP opens drag the DRMed file into it (or click File/Open and browse for the file). After a few seconds a popup box will appear with some information about the file, click Ok. (This will create a folder drm2 on the desktop, dont worry about this)

4) Drag the DRMed file onto drm2wmv_e.exe, when this has finished you will have a new file, same name as the original but with a [NoDRM] prefix… thats it, your done

*Troubleshooting*
Ok, things dont always run smooth, i’ve come across some weird problems while trying this out on other systems, so heres something to try if all else fails, go to c:\documents and settings\all users\drm <– delete it, run the protected file, this should recreate the drm folder when the license is downloaded, then go to http://services.wmdrm.windowsmedia.com/indivSite and click upgrade, this fixed my problems on a couple of things, see how you get on
Thanks to all the guys at Doom9, i wrote this guide based on my own results after reading through a forum thread there.

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