> <[email protected]> wrote: > > > > The reason for me to ask is: the UEFI "BIOS" loads the EFI network > > stack (on top of a Realtek HW-specific driver DXE) before trying to > > actually boot from some device in the sequence... > > A response from Randy Goldenberg: > > The network stack often won't be loaded at all at boot if not > enabled in the computer's firmware. > > This is typically a separate setting from the one used to enable the > network interface.
exactly right. In the vanilla AMI APTIO UEFI, which is what I meet most of the times nowadays, there's a global setting "network stack" enable/disable (means the UEFI networking and network boot support), then there may be per Ethernet port "enable/disable" elements (or submenus, or "presence listings"), and then there may be the CSM submenu, containing choices what option ROM types to load (Storage, Network, video, ...) and UEFI vs. Legacy (meaning legacy BIOS API's, which is what the CSM implements). And only after you get all these options right, and a reboot, the next time you enter the BIOS setup, you get a bootable NIC "boot entry". Definitely not without all bits of the network stack being loaded, ready to launch DHCP probes. To Marek: Also note that the network boot entries in the BIOS SETUP are of two types that look slightly different: UEFI vs. legacy BIOS boot. If the "list of bootable devices" contains a legacy PXE boot entry, the UEFI network boot stack does not get loaded. Frank
