Novell Home

Adding NIC Drivers to the PXE-on-Disk Utility

Novell Cool Solutions: Trench

Digg This - Slashdot This

Posted: 7 Aug 2003 		 

Updated with Reader Suggestion.

Check out the following info received from Preworx on how to add a driver for PXE on Disk. In this example, they were asked how to add a driver for the D-Link DFE-538TX card. This particular driver seems consistent with settings of other NICs in PXECLIENT.INI. Following this example, you should be able to add drivers for most NICs.

  1. Search for the NIC on the "Driver Down Load Page For D-Link"
  2. Copy [DRIVERNAME].dos or .exe file (the NDIS2 dos driver.
    • Copy the [DLKRTS.INI] file to the PXE-on-Disk directory. You will usually find [DRIVERNAME].DOS FILE in the \\NDIS2\DOS or \\MSLANMAN.DOS\ directories.
  3. Edit\Copy the PROTOCOL.INI file.
    1. Add the PreWorX section name to the top of the file
    2. Delete all except the DriverName = [DRIVERNAME]$

      Example:
      {[PreWorX]
      DriverName = DLKRTS$
      You don't need to delete the comments}
    3. Rename the PROTOCOL.INI FILE TO THE [DRIVERNAME].INI
      Example: DLKRTS.INI
    4. Copy the [DRIVERNAME].INI file to the PXE-on-Diskdirectory
  4. Edit the PXEClient.ini file located in the PXE-on-Disk directory Add the following to the end of the PXEClient.ini file 
    [DFE538TX]
DeviceName	=D-Link DFE-538TX 10/100 Network Adapter
Driver1		=dlkrts.dos
LoadOptions1	=1
ImageType1	=9
LofLEntry1	=1
Parameters1	=

Driver2		=dlkrts.ini
LoadOptions2	=4
ImageType2	=9
LofLEntry2	=4
Parameters2	=

Driver3		=undi40.bin
Loadoptions3	=1
ImageType3	=1
LofLEntry3	=5
Parameters3	=

Driver4		=pxe.bin
Loadoptions4	=4
ImageType4	=1
LofLEntry4	=7
Parameters4	=

VendorID1	=0x1186
DeviceID1	=0x1300

The VendorID and DeviceID fields can usualy be found in the driver .inf file.

It is also possible for a driver to support multiple adapters. In such a case just add them as follows:

VendorID1 	=XxXXXX
DeviceID1	=YxYYYY
VendorID2 	=AxAAAA
DeviceID2	=BxBBBB
VendorID3 	=GxGGGG
DeviceID3	=HxHHHH

Reader Suggestion

Dennis H. wrote: Great tip!!

Needed this for being able to test PXE imaging on Connectix VirtualPC (ver5.2); using D-Link's drivers for DFE500TX network card.

At first, following the guidelines, it didn't work (PCI card not found); then I simply removed the VendorID1 and DeviceID1 lines in the end of PXEClient.ini, and built a new !PXE-on-DIsk image; now it works like a bliss.


Novell Cool Solutions (corporate web communities) are produced by WebWise Solutions. www.webwiseone.com

© 2013 Novell