christos@zoulas.com said:
> The way to do a match is to first check the vendor specific id, and
> then failing to match one, try the compat ids. 

Nearly -- first the device's PnP ID (which is at different places
in isapnp and pnpbios btw.) is checked, and then the "compatible
IDs". The IDs have the same syntax and belong into the same
namespace imho. What makes an ID to the devices' primary ID
is that the vendor has put it at a special place.

> [PNP???? is reserved for devcompat devices] 

Really? I didn't read this anywhere, and all PnP BIOSes I've
seen so far would be broken in this case.

> I had been tinkering with it a while ago, but never got farther than
> reading the bios signature :-) 

Did you have a look at ACPI? At least at the signatures...

best regards
Matthias