[syslinux] PXELinux with 3C509 and mba-on-disk or with vmware

[Andrea Rossato]

HI there.
Probably my message is a bit off topic but I do not know where else I 
could be asking.
.
I'm running a linux terminal server with one client provided with a 
3C509B ISA card. I boot the later with a floppy bootable rom image taken 
from http://www.rom-o-matic.net/
Everything is working just fine. I decided to try to set up a PXE 
network boot (I'll needed it for installing a linux system on a laptop 
with a capable XPE bios and without floppy or bootable cdroms) and I 
tried two different approach, both failed.

1. With the 3C509B ISA card
Since this card has not pxe capabilities I download from 3com an mba on 
disk kit: that allows you to create a bootable disk for network booting 
(http://www.3com.com/products/en_US/result.jsp?selected=5&sort=effdt&order=desc&sku=3CMBA-D). 
It offers the possibility to use different boot methods, among which PXE 
and tcp/ip with dhcp.
If I create a disk with PXE the system seems  to boot: a mba disk loader 
appears, followed by a screen with copyrights (by Intel 3com etc). After 
that everything stops with an 'unable to read from media' message.
I tried also tcp/ip with dhcp, but in this case the dhcp request seems 
to fail. While booting a message that reads "node 000000000000" appears: 
that, AFAIK, should be the mac address of the network card, which is 
obviously wrong.
Any idea of what is causing my problem? (I've read success stories about 
using a 3c509 with mba on disk for pxe network booting).

2. with vmware
According to 
http://www.zytor.com/pipermail/syslinux/2003-May/002043.html, even 
though vmware has not a pxe capable bios, using a M$ RIS boot disk, that 
is a PXE stack on disk, you should be able to boot a VM.
I created a boot disk with rbgf.exe.Booted and thats the output:
AMD PCnet Adapter
Node: [the correct mac address]
DHCP...
TFTP...

PXELINUX 2.06 2003-08-22 Copyright....
Found PXENV+ structure
PXE API version is 0063
Old PXE API detected, using PXENV+ structure
UNDI data segment at    991B
UNDI data segment size: 564D
UNDI code segment at:   97BD
UNDI code segment size: 15E0
PXENV entry point found (we hope) at 941F:0DAF

then nothing happens.

Given this information do you thing I'm soffering of a configuration 
problem somewhere? Any idea, suggestion? I searched the net without 
finding any useful answer.
Any clue would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks,
Andrea