HOWTO Network Boot a LRP based machine using Etherboot & Dachstein
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7. Bits and Pieces

Otherwise known as miscellaneous!

7.1. An example, if the card driver cannot be found....

I have used an Eagle systems Intl ISA card which uses the lance driver under Linux quite happily. The Etherboot Drivers list does not ( Okay that's a didn't because it does now ;-) ) list it under the AMD section and the Etherboot driver for lance is for a PCI card.

The main chip on the network card is identified as an AM79C960KC  243GB5M  © 1992 AMD.  Using this we grep the source tree (after compiling the drivers) for the string "79C960" with the following result ...

09:34pm $grep -r src -e 79C960
      src/depca.c:   
         4) "Am79C960 PCnet-ISA(tm), Single-Chip Ethernet Controller for ISA",
      Binary file src/bin32/ni6510.img matches
      Binary file src/bin32/ni6510.rom matches
      Binary file src/bin32/ni6510.tmp matches
      Binary file src/bin32/lance.o matches
      Binary file src/bin32/ni6510.o matches
      Binary file src/bin32/pcnetfastiii.rom matches
      Binary file src/bin32/amdhomepna.rom matches
      Binary file src/bin32/ne2100.o matches
      Binary file src/bin32/ne2100.img matches
      Binary file src/bin32/ne2100.rom matches
      Binary file src/bin32/ne2100.tmp matches
      Binary file src/bin32/lance.img matches
      Binary file src/bin32/lance.tmp matches
      Binary file src/bin32/lancepci.rom matches
      src/lance.c:  {0x0003, "PCnet/ISA 79C960",        /* 79C960 PCnet/ISA.  */
      src/lance.c:      /* This is 79C960 specific; Turn on auto-select of media

So the 79C960 is there and as an ISA driver as well.

Investigating the associated .lzrom files we can dismiss the lance as it only comes as a PCI driver, Working down the list we eventually try the ne2100 and bingo we have a winner.   Of course if you had the manual it would tell you that the Novell ne2100 driver would have worked, but then manuals do not always come with second-hand cards.

The NIC page at the Rom-o-matic site or in the distributions src tree    etherboot-5.0.5/src/NIC    gives confirmation that the above files are indeed lance drivers but do not mention the 79C960 specifically.

7.2. Fan power regulator

This circuit needs to be read along with Section 4.6 and the warnings displayed there.     It is my representation of an existing circuit found with a power supply I had.   It is provided as a curiosity and I would expect only the adventurous or knowledgeable would want to pursue it, all the information I can help with is provided with it.

In that context, let me know if you get it working :-)

Depending on your browser, this fine example of ASCII art may appear to be garbled, to decrypt it you will need to use special tools.

In this case vi and only vi.

Okay -- the power lies with fixed fonts, so it needs to be viewed with anything that displays in fixed, cutting and pasting into vi will work a treat, as should other plain text editors.

.                ______________________________________o + input
                |   555d IC   |             __      |
 output   + o---|    o  o  o  o 1           /       | TTC 10k ohm
                |____   |  `------------\/\/\/--|   |  thermistor
                     |  |                 /     |   |
                     |  `--+------+--+----------'   |
 output   - o---|    |     |      |  |              |
                |    o  o  o  o   |  |              |
      |-----o e |       |     |   |  |   30k        |
      |         |       |     |   |  `--\/\/\/------'
      |   c o---'       |     | __|__
      |                 |     | _____
      |   b o---\/\/\/--'     |   |  104 poly cap
      |           1k          |   |
      |_______________________|___|____________________o - input

         9013 switching transistor NPN
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