Re: [Etherboot-developers] Q: Multiple drivers.

[<ke...@us...>]

>Hmm. Then it isn't intentional that etherboot always boots the first
>NIC of that type in the system?

If it does it's by accident. A case in point is my firewall with two
3c509 NICs. Currently Etherboot always boots the first detected NIC,
using 3com's recommended probe algorithm, which resolves the address of
all 3c509s on the bus one bit at a time, and is the same algorithm used
in the Becker driver. So I have to be careful to put Etherboot on the
first detected NIC on the system. Otherwise I could send out the request
to the cable modem, which would give me an address, but would be useless
for TFTP loading.

Without a preference for the home NIC, when the code is on the NIC slot,
one could have a situation where adding a NIC to the system upsets a
working boot setup.

And as stressed before, this should be a compile time option.