[syslinux] PXE 0.99h stacks... any chance?

[Michael Quaintance]

Hi

I have searched the site, list archives, google etc and have not been 
able to find an appropriate answer so I am asking it here. Apologies if 
this has been answered already.

I have a kiosk-style pc which I wish to remote boot to keep it quiet. 
This way I don't need a hard disk at all, keeping it truly silent as it 
has a passive cpu cooler. Unfortunately, it has no upgrade options. I 
am unable to add any expansion cards, etc. It has a PXE stack built-in 
but this is an "Intel LANDesk Service Agent II version 0.99h". As this 
machine is very old, I have been unable to find a firmware upgrade for 
it so I'm a bit stuck.

I have noticed that the Intel 0.99 PXE stacks are notoriously buggy and 
the recommendation is to upgrade but this is currently impossible. 
However, I am willing to bend over backwards on the other end to get 
this working. Basically, I have a spare machine that is very noisy but 
I can put in a different room and run as a headless server to drive the 
kiosk pc. The kiosk will then run LTSP or equivalent, keeping all of 
the heavy processing on the well-powered server. The kiosk pc would be 
the only remote client, keeping the network load down.

I am prepared to run any free-as-in-beer os on the server and any 
services required but unfortunately, as I wish to run the kiosk pc on 
the same wireless subnet as the rest of the house, I can't keep it 
truly separate. There is a web/ftp/file/mail/etc server on the network 
(OpenBSD), a hardware NAT firewall protecting me from the perils of the 
internet, and two ordinary client machines (Mac OSX and a multi-boot 
x86).

Basically, as I cannot fix the 0.99h client firmware, is what I want to 
attempt even worth trying? Are there any particular gotcha's for 0.99h 
clients I ought to know and any specific versions of software (other 
than the latest) I should stick to? As I am flexible on host OS for the 
server, are there any particular recommendations for ones more likely 
to work or easier to use for this task?

Sorry for asking a lot of questions in one email.

Thanks in advance.

-Michael