Trying to boot from a network optical drive...

Anastomosis

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Aug 28, 2006
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So I have a wireless router (D-Link) which attaches itself to two desktop computers, named Tempest (attached to port 1 on the router) and Oldskool (attached to port 2). Both are running Windows XP Pro. When both computers are in XP, I can see/ping/share with either computer, no problem.

The problem is that I want to boot from a DVD on Oldskool and it doesn't have a DVD drive. So I figured that I could set my DVD drive on Tempest to be shared and that Oldskool could boot from it.

Haven't gotten it to work so far. I have obtained Bart's Network Boot Disk (I assume most are familiar with this) running his MSNET and that has been operational in the sense that it loads up, recognizes Oldskool's NIC, and allows me to try to set it up. I have tried in TCP/IP mode. I tried to set it up with the DHCP settings on, but that never was able to obtain an IP address. (just froze while saying "trying to obtain IP..." or something)
So I turned DHCP off and assigned these values:
IP address: 192.168.0.102 (confirmed - no other computer has this address)
Subnet Mask: 255.255.255.0
Default Gateway: 192.168.0.1 (the IP of my router - I've also tried without this)
All other values are 0.0.0.0.
Then it asks for logon info (I tell it Anastomosis as a user name, with no password, computer name OLDSKOOL, workgroup name ANGIONET; these are my comp/wkgrp names as set up in XP, but I don't think that matters... anyway)

It proceeds without problems, then asks for my logon info and pass, I provide these, it gives me a DOS prompt. I then cannot ping TEMPEST or even my router for that matter. The only thing it can ping is itself, of course. I tried mapping \\TEMPEST\DVD (the name of the drive on the network), but of course that's not going to work if it can't even ping TEMPEST.

So that's where I am. Does anyone have any advice on:
1) How can I get this MSNET to find my router/other computers and boot from a network drive?
... or, more importantly:
2) Am I doing this totally wrong and is there a way to boot from a network optical drive that I haven't figured out?

P.S. Yes I could just pull out the DVD drive from Tempest and physically install it into Oldskool, but I'm trying to learn about networking and this has taught me SO much so far.

Thank you!
 

fredweston

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Jul 21, 2006
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I've never tried to do what you want, but I don't think it will work without some type of special software other than BartPE. It's more or less a limitation of the BIOS, most of them support booting from IDE/SCSI devices, and perhaps USB. Most recent BIOS' can boot from the network, but not in the sense that you want. Google for information on "PXE" to find out more, there might be some solution out there, but I kind of doubt it...