Problem remote booting 3C905B Card from PROM

[Mark_Zehner@dartcontainer.com]

I have programmed an etherboot PROM image with the etherboot 3c90x image for
remote booting.
I created a 65K image using the command:
     (cat 3c90x.lzrom; perl -e 'print "\xFF" x 49152') >3ctop.65k
I then used a PROM programmer to program an Atmel AT29C51212PC chip to work on
my 3com cards.
I can put the programmed PROM into a 3C905-TX NIC and it will work fine.  If I
put the same PROM into
a 3C905B-TX NIC and it will not see the ROM, even though I have set the
computer's BIOS to boot from
the NIC and have set the NIC configuration, using 3c90xcfg.exe, to enable the
PROM with 65k setting.
I have read the 3c90x.txt file about the 3com bug that won't allow images larger
than 8k to load and the
fix.  It said you must set the card internally to the MII transceiver.  So I
modified the etherboot Config file
and added the following line:
     CFLAGS+=       -DCFG_3C905B_XCVR=6
for MII mode and made an etherboot floppy.
Then I modified it again to value "=8" for Auto negociation.  I made my boot
PROM with this image.
Then I booted using the floppy and then tried to boot without the floppy, and as
usual I got the message
"DISK BOOT FAILURE...".  It still didn't work.  I did have the line:
     90X_SIGNATURE=0x9050
in my Etherboot Config file when I made both the floppy and the PROM images.
Could this line be
causing a problem?  It is set for 10/100 TPO.  Should it be 10/100 T4?
Perhaps I don't understand the 3c90x.txt file.  Did I follow the correct
procedure for getting it into MII
and autonegociate modes?  Reading the documentation, I would think, that all
that is needed is
to boot from the floppy prior to booting from the PROM.
Even if I try booting from a floppy, then the PROM, both without the
DCFG_3C905B_XCVR options set
as above, the floppy boot worked but the PROM boot still did not work.

Thanks in advance for any help.

Mark


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