Netboot / PXE boot with UEFI Payload

Some users may choose to boot their operating system over a network. This guide shows how to use Netboot to enable booting over a network.

netboot.xyz lets you PXE boot various operating system installers or utilities over the network. iPXE is an open source network boot firmware. It provides a full PXE implementation.

netboot.xyz can be built as an UEFI Application and can be included in the UEFI Payload. The UEFI Payload can be customized to launch the netboot.xyz application as a boot target.

The steps below provide instruction on how to build UEFI Payload with netboot.xyz application -

Steps:

  1. Clone the edk2 repository.

  2. Create a new directory inside edk2\UefiPayloadPkg called NetBoot.

  3. Create a new directory inside edk2\UefiPayloadPkg\NetBoot called X64.

  4. Download the netboot.xyz binary from here and place it into the directory created above - i.e. inside edk2\UefiPayloadPkg\NetBoot\X64

  5. Create a new file called NetBoot.inf in edk2\UefiPayloadPkg\NetBoot and paste the following contents in it -

 1##  @file
 2#  This is the Netboot binary file.
 3#
 4#  Copyright (c) 2021, Intel Corporation. All rights reserved.<BR>
 5#
 6#  This program and the accompanying materials
 7#  are licensed and made available under the terms and conditions of the BSD License
 8#  which accompanies this distribution. The full text of the license may be found at
 9#  http://opensource.org/licenses/bsd-license.php
10#  THE PROGRAM IS DISTRIBUTED UNDER THE BSD LICENSE ON AN "AS IS" BASIS,
11#  WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR REPRESENTATIONS OF ANY KIND, EITHER EXPRESS OR IMPLIED.
12#
13#
14##
15##
16
17[Defines]
18  INF_VERSION                    = 0x00010006
19  BASE_NAME                      = NetBoot
20  FILE_GUID                      = 4CDF2DAE-B4C7-482C-B468-99C812911FF5
21  MODULE_TYPE                    = UEFI_APPLICATION
22  VERSION_STRING                 = 1.0
23
24[Binaries.X64]
25  PE32|X64/NetBoot.efi|*

  1. Open edk2\UefiPayloadPkg\UefiPayloadPkg.dec and add the following line in the [Guids] section -

gUefiPayloadNetBootAppGuid = { 0x4cdf2dae, 0xb4c7, 0x482c, { 0xb4, 0x68, 0x99, 0xc8, 0x12, 0x91, 0x1f, 0xf5 } }

  1. Open edk2\UefiPayloadPkg\UefiPayloadPkg.fdf and add the following line at the end of the [FV.DXEFV] section.

# NetBoot
INF  RuleOverride = BINARY USE = X64 UefiPayloadPkg/NetBoot/NetBoot.inf

  1. In the same file, comment out the line in the Shell part under the [FV.DXEFV] section.

  2. Open edk2\UefiPayloadPkg\Library\PlatformBootManagerLib\PlatformBootManager.c and add the following line in the PlatformBootManagerAfterConsole function after EfiBootManagerRefreshAllBootOption() call -

// Register Netboot
PlatformRegisterFvBootOption (&gUefiPayloadNetBootAppGuid, L"Netboot (iPXE)", LOAD_OPTION_ACTIVE);

  1. Open edk2\UefiPayloadPkg\Library\PlatformBootManagerLib\PlatformBootManagerLib.inf and add the following line in the [Guids] section -

gUefiPayloadNetBootAppGuid

  1. Build the UEFI Payload: UEFI Payload Build Instructions

  2. Copy the generated UEFIPAYLOAD.fd into slimbootloader\PayloadPkg\PayloadBins\UefiNetBoot.fd

  3. Build SBL for your platform

python BuildLoader.py build <platform> -p "OsLoader.efi:LLDR:Lz4;UefiNetBoot.fd:UEFI:Lzma"

  1. Flash and boot