Missing Network boot option in BIOS.

[wsuetholz]

Hello,
  I got this Soyo SY-P4RC350 board, partially because it had onboard Composite and S-Video out, and partly because I had a P4 2Ghz processor from a dead machine lying about.  I had it working with Knoppmyth, and would like to use it "mostly" diskless.  I have some 64meg IDE Flash drives, that I'd like to use for the initial boot (just one if possible).  Can anybody point me the correct way to do this..  The BIOS doesn't seem to have an option to enable network boot, and I don't see it doing the PXE inquiry at all.

  More clearly (possibly :-)

  I want the machine to boot the Linux kernel from the Flash drive, and then act as if it is a diskless boot client by getting the rest of it's system from the Core system.

  .. So much to do, so little time <hmm> ..

Bill

[darrenmason]

Hi,

You need to initiate a PXE network boot. This is usually done by a BIOS setting as you know, however it is just a piece of software that needs to be run and can also be loaded on another boot device.
I have successfully done this on to a floppy disk, but can see no reason why it couldn't go on other devices such as a CF hard drive or CDROM.
There is software available on the net which assists in building an image that can be written to the boot device.
Try http://rom-o-matic.net/5.4.3/
You need to know exactly what network card (chipset) is in use.
Regards
Darren

[wsuetholz]

There is another option...  Just turn off the onboard NIC, and put one in that does do network boot...  I'll go back and revisit the CF boot later, when the waste of a NIC card gets too me :-)

That boots at least, now I'm sitting here with a message saying it announced itself to the router, and to use an Orbiter to continue...   I thought this would boot into an orbiter!  Oh well, back to searching for answers.

Bill

[robertsaron]

You could also try using DSL, that stands for damn small linux. This can fit on a USB thumb drive, this was recommended to me when I was looking into a similar thing you are doing.

[darrenmason]

I have been meaning to try something similar with DSL but time hasn't allowed it yet.
My plan was to build a minimal installation which acts as a Media Director but perhaps audio only and with on Orbiter.
The intention would be to utilise very old, low memory, low CPU power PCs that I have.
So far I have got as far as putting DSL on one and playing around a bit. I have not put any Pluto(linuxMCE) software on it yet.
I am yet to determine how much Kernel reliance there is though.

Hopefully I will get to do some more on it soon.

regards
Darren

[jimmejames]

I have the same MB and have the same issue- did you find a solution other than buying a PXE ready NIC?


Thanks

[jimmejames]

PXE is not natively supported (confirmed by SOYO).  If you follow the below instructions, you can get the onboard lan to boot from the network).  Works great with my usb floppy.   I've updated the Wiki page...

If you visit: http://rom-o-matic.net/5.4.3/ and download the third file from the bottom (via-velocity:via-velocity -- [0x1106,0x3119]) and use the provided instructions (download the .zdsk file, copy it to a foppy using cat eb-5.4.3-via-velocity.zdsk > /dev/fd0) you can get the motherboard to boot from the network.