A method for enabling value-added hardware on an interface board in a
computer system is disclosed. The method first determines whether an
interface board is connected to a bus of a computer system. Then, a
general-purpose top-level device driver, which controls standard functions
associated with the interface board, is loaded into kernel memory space of
the computer system. Next, a value-added device driver is loaded into
memory of the computer system. The value-added device driver corresponds
to the interface board determined to be connected to the bus of the
computer system. Predetermined information, such as a password, or
confidential or cryptographic information, is stored at a predetermined
address within a memory space of the interface board. The predetermined
address corresponds to a predetermined address within value-added hardware
on the interface board. A predetermined response is received from the
interface board based on the predetermined information. Access to the
value-added hardware is enabled through the value-added device driver when
the predetermined response is an expected response. The value-added device
driver can be loaded into kernel memory of the computer, or can be part of
an application program that is loaded into user memory of the computer.
