Hey guys, I have a fairly odd situation here. I have all OSD Task Sequence advertisements set to "PXE and Boot Media (hidden)" and all are optional (not mandatory). I use a powershell form via prestart command to give the user a choice which limits what task sequences they choose. When everything is working, this process works. Unknown desktop-class systems see desktop task sequences, and server-class systems see server task sequences.
Here's where it's different when I use different boot methods:
Boot Media
- "Welcome to the Task Sequence Wizard" is presented. User hits or clicks Enter.
- Powershell form is presented; user picks their task sequence
- Confirmation screen is presented with the task sequence they selected (this is an OSD screen the same size as the "Welcome to the Task Sequence Wizard" screen.
- Dependency check screen is shown with a progress bar. If a package is missing from a DP, it will display an error here with the PackageID. This looks the same as "Regular" OSD with standard non-hidden advertisements.
PXE Boot
- "Welcome to the Task Sequence Wizard" is never displayed.
- Powershell form is the first screen they see. They select it and it continues.
- No confirmation screen is presented if the system is known; if it is an unknown system, a small dialog says there is a*mandatory* task sequence about to be run and it will run in 180 seconds. Users can hit enter.
- No dependency check screen is shown; and if a package was missing, instead of presenting an error, it simply reboots. However, if everything is there, the process starts successfully.
While I have no problems with the first window never being displayed, not displaying the error dialog and simply rebooting is what is bothersome to me. 99% of our builds are from PXE boot.
Again, these task sequences are all 100% optional, NOT mandatory, and I've double checked this multiple times. Can anyone explain why we get different behavior between boot media and PXE boot? Any way of getting PXE boot to "mimic" the Boot media behavior?
I followed the guide here:
If you see the image here: http://www.windows-noob.com/forums/uploads/monthly_09_2012/post-1-0-29840100-1348236179.png
You'll see the "Retrieving policy for this computer..." dialog box - I never get that with PXE - just Boot Media.
Note that I am running 2012 R2, not 2012 SP1 - but I never got a chance to test this process with SP1.
Upon further experimentation, the "hidden" task sequence has nothing to do with this. If I change it to a normal, non-hidden advertisement, as long as the "prestart" command in the boot image is used, we don't get those missing dialog boxes at all, with PXE.