Question

[Aaron Gage <agage@riemann.mines.edu>]

I just wanted to float this question past the group to see what happens.

I am attempting to boot a Linux box from another box on the same network.
I have bootpd installed, and using another functional machine, I can verify
that it catches requests and sends back information (using bootptest).

The "diskless" machine has a floppy drive, which I have been trying to
boot using netboot version 0.8.1.

The machine I am attempting to boot does in fact work; I can boot it to
DOS or Linux using only the floppy drive.  Using DOS, I configured a
(cheap) NIC and used Linux to get the 40-bit ethernet address.  So the
hardware all seems to work fine.

I seem to have run into the problem with received packets not being
handled properly by the ethernet card.  This is the scenario which
is described in the docs as not receiving a bootp answer and just
printing dots.  The best information I can find on this is that it
is more likely in cheap NIC's.  I have tried using the included packet
drivers, but to no avail.

When run with the diagnostic tools compiled in, I get the following
hex values dumped when I try to boot;

45 00 01 48 00 01 00 00 FF 11 BA A4 00 00 00 00 FF FF FF FF 00 44
               --                ==

The number with the -- below it increments with each packet, and the
number with the == below it decrements with each packet.

My hub shows that the packets are being sent by both machines properly.
The problem seems to be in receiving it on the diskless side.

So I'm curious.  Am I just paying the price for not buying a better NIC?
Is there a workaround or better approach I should try?  Is there a
newer version of the code I should be looking at?  The ethernet card is
supposed to be NE2000 compatible, and is a simple jumperless ISA 
combo card.

I would appreciate any information on this matter.  I feel like I am
extremely close to getting this to work, and that I just need to
wrestle with the software a bit, but I'm not sure just what to do
at this point.

Thank you.

--Aaron