Recovering Windows Server 2003 on HP Integrity Servers

Add safe mode to the EFI boot option menu

When you are troubleshooting a startup problem, you may need to return to the safe mode several times

before the problem is identified and solved. Each time you enter safe mode, you must hit the F8 key or

the Esc 8 keys at precisely the right time during boot. Unless you have the hand-to-eye co-ordination of a

gamer, you may find it easier to add a boot entry for startup options and select this entry at boot time.

On HP Integrity servers, the firmware is based on the Extensible Firmware Interface (EFI) specification.

EFI stores boot options in non-volatile random access memory (NVRAM), a storage medium that can be

edited, but retains its state even after you power off the server. You can edit boot options in EFI NVRAM

using two tools provided by Windows Server 2003: bootcfg and nvrboot.

Using bootcfg

The bootcfg command lets you edit boot options while the OS is running. You can use bootcfg to add,

delete, and change the values of all valid boot options. You can also use bootcfg commands in a script

or batch file to set boot options or to reset them after you replace or upgrade an operating system.

To add two safe modes — minimal and network — to the EFI boot option menu using bootcfg:

1. At the command prompt, type the following command:

c:\>bootcfg

The command displays the following output:

Boot Options

------------

Timeout: 20

Default:

\Device\HarddiskDmVolumes\PhysicalDmVolumes\BlockVolume1\WINDOWS

CurrentBootEntryID: 1

Boot Entries

------------

Boot entry ID: 1

OS Friendly Name: Windows Server 2003, Enterprise

OsLoadOptions: /redirect

BootFilePath:

\Device\HarddiskVolume1\EFI\Microsoft\WINNT50\ia64ldr.efi

OsFilePath:

\Device\HarddiskDmVolumes\PhysicalDmVolumes\BlockVolume1\WINDOWS

Boot entry ID: 2

OS Friendly Name: Internal Bootable DVD

Boot entry ID: 3

OS Friendly Name: EFI Shell [Built-in]