Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!husc6!bloom-beacon!mit-eddie!uw-beaver!cornell!batcomputer!wilker
From: wilker@batcomputer.tn.cornell.edu (Clarence W. Wilkerson Jr.)
Newsgroups: comp.protocols.tcp-ip.ibmpc
Subject: Re: Boot PROM for NI5210.
Summary: Why would the boot prom
	 have to be on ethernet card?
Message-ID: <5207@batcomputer.tn.cornell.edu>
Date: 18 Jun 88 03:02:00 GMT
References: <8806171451.AA02658@vax.ftp.com> <8806172001.AA28772@cai.utah.edu>
Organization: Theory Center, Cornell U., Ithaca NY
Lines: 13

> Yes, Novell can, but the interface card needs to have a PROM socket
> that conforms to IBM's definition for extending BIOS.  The Micom 5210
> card has NO such socket.  The 3c501 does (it's called MEMORY on my
> card).
> 
> Brad Davis

Many motherboards have extra sockets for ROM ( the missing BASIC?).
So that seems like the least of the worries about booting from
network. More complicated is building enough intelligence into
ROM to download dos from file server, and short circuiting the
attempted dos floppy/hard disk boots.