A method and apparatus for preboot file and information transfer between workstations (13) and other workstations (15) or workstations (13) and servers (11) on local area networks. During a workstation boot sequence, the various components of the workstation and network operating system are loaded and executed. Since all control of the workstation after the boot sequence is passed to the workstation operating system, any mangement tasks performed after boot must be performed by application programs (23) running on the workstation. The present invention overcomes problems created by using such application programs to perform management tasks by providing a hardware component (27), for example a ROM or PROM (61) containing appropriate programming placed in the usually unused boot ROM socket of a LAN card installed in the individual workstations (13), or a chip including a PROM or ROM (61) built onto the motherboard or system board of the individual workstations. The program in the PROM (61) is set up so that, at system start-up (31), prior to loading of the workstation operating system software during the boot sequence, it performs certain operating system functions (35) by using the basic input/output system (BIOS) of the workstation to enable the workstation to communicate with a server on the network and make the necessary resource of the workstation available to a server management application (11c) running on the server via the network. This process, controlled by a system administrator (15), allows a variety of preboot functions to take place in the workstation.