Re: NIC identification with PXE?

On Fri, May 27, 2005 at 04:53:38PM +0100, John Connett wrote:
> We use PXE and Etherboot to install FreeBSD 4 systems.  Until recently
> all of these systems used Intel EtherExpressPro1000 82540EM NICs so all
> that was necessary was to have the DHCP server reply with the
> "e1000.zpxe" file.
> 
> Now systems that use Broadcom Tigon 3 5721 NICs are being introduced
> which require the "tg3.zpxe" file.
> 
> Is there a mechanism by which the DHCP server can automatically
> determine the model of NIC that is being used so that it can reply with
> the matching file?  We use a custom DHCP server which can be modified if
> necessary.

Check the manual of that DHCP server to provide different
answers based on incoming request.

This is practise is in "tjener" of debian-edu /etc/dhcp3/dhcpd.conf
 ( ISC DHCP server )


  if substring (option vendor-class-identifier, 0, 9) = "PXEClient" {
    filename              "/tftpboot/lts/pxelinux.0";
  } else if substring (option vendor-class-identifier, 0, 9) = "Etherboot" {
    filename              "/tftpboot/lts/vmlinuz-2.4.19-ltsp-1";
  }





> Thanks in anticipation

Looking forward to your report where you tell how you solved this
(off-topic) problem.


> --
> John
> 
> PS. Once I have a solution to this problem I will be able to test
> Timothy Legge's Broadcom 5721 patch.  This is the onboard NIC for the
> Fujitsu-Siemens TX150 S3.

Ah, a promise, that is good.



Cheers
Geert Stappers

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