You are right. The diskless-boot support in GRUB is from Etherboot-5.0.5, but for ethereboot changed its PCI and NIC drivers in version 5.2.x/5.3.x greatly, we met some difficult in synchronizing the latest drivers with it. :(
Some forerunners transported Intel GB NIC driver from some 'later' version of etherboot to GRUB 0.93 with a patch. They called the driver 'e1000', that's why you can find some discussion about '--enable-e1000' in configure. I get a version of that patch from a friend, but I soon found it didn't work on my 82545EM chip. And I also found that if I wanted to update the driver to the new version in Etherboot-5.3.3, I nearly had to redo all these 'transport' jobs that the original patch writer did. ---- It would cause lots of redundancy in code and develop work. So, with the support of Okuji, I rewrote all the diskless-boot support code in GRUB to sync with Etherboot-5.3.4, and released it as a patch to the 'CVS HEAD' I checked out on 2003-10-28. For the version define in the code is GRUB 0.94, I called the code I got from CVS HEAD as GRUB 0.94-1, and named my patch 'grub-0.94-diskless-1.patch', mean that the patch worked only with the current code on CVS , not with the official release GRUB 0.93. That's why you found some one talking about the new diskless support in GRUB 0.94 ---- In fact, GRUB 0.94 is still in developing. *^_^* For the official CVS is not modified ever since 2003-10-19, my GRUB 0.94-1 is still CVS HEAD ;-). So, my patch sill works on the current CVS HEAD :-). James Scott also provided a patch to the official GRUB 0.93. ---- All these patches can be found on https://savannah.gnu.org/bugs/?func=detailitem&item_id=6690 . You can download the appropriate patch from there and have a try :-). I also will notice the list when new patches are available. BTW: The e1000 driver in patch works on 82545EM. It should support 82540. But we sill not support 3C940. If someone can provide an 'etherboot-style' driver, we can support it right now. Feng Shuo -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Schlabach, Torsten Sent: Thursday, November 27, 2003 11:58 PM To: '[EMAIL PROTECTED]' Subject: GRUB 0.94 / Etherboot / 3C940 or e1000 ... some confusion Dear list, I am somewhat new at least to the internals of GRUB and therefore have a hard time getting some issues sorted out. What I am trying to achive is to have a new server boot from the network with GRUB that has two NICs: - 3Com 3C940 (on board of the Asus A7V600 motherboard, Linux says 00:09.0 Ethernet controller: 3Com Corporation 3c940 1000Base? (rev 12)) - Intel Gigabit (Linux says: 00:0e.0 Ethernet controller: Intel Corp. 82540EM Gigabit Ethernet Controller (rev 02)) I have downloaded GRUB 0.93 but neither card is supported. Therefore I did some searching on the mailing list and got even more confused. So I wonder: - GRUB is using Etherboot's drivers. Etherboot has a driver for e1000 (which I believe is my Intel card). But someone reports that it is not just a matter of moving it in. - Someone else writes that he compiles GRUB with --enable-e1000. I cannot find this option. I even checked out the CVS version, but could not find it. - Someone else is posting a patch to GRUB 0.94. I can only find 0.93 in the CVS. Or is 0.94 == CVS HEAD? But then again, in the CVS head, no --enable-e1000. Also I have a hard time believing that nobody ever had the problem to boot with GRUB through any of the recent and widely sold Gigabit Ethernet cards. Can anyone point me to 0.94, let me know how to integrate the e1000 driver or give me any other useful hint? Kind regards, ----------------------------------------- Torsten Schlabach +49 228 936 34735 [EMAIL PROTECTED] T-Mobile Deutschland GmbH ----------------------------------------- _______________________________________________ Bug-grub mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/bug-grub _______________________________________________ Bug-grub mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/bug-grub