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How Good is Commercial BIOS Code?

Posted by Cliff on from the things-users-generally-neglect dept.

Bitten-by-BIOSbugs asks: "My job involves porting PC BIOS code supplied by one of the Big Names to my employer's products. In my experience, this code seems to be so full of holes you could strain pasta with it. However, the vendor seems not to care when I report bugs, and rarely have fixes been made available. What is the experience of other Slashdot readers regarding the quality of commercial BIOS products?"

1 of 60 comments (clear)

  1. Are there still BIOSs in new PCs? by Animats · · Score: 4, Interesting
    Is there still a BIOS, the "basic input-output system" that's the low-level part of DOS, in current boot ROMs? You need a boot loader and a hardware initializer, but is there any remaining need for a basic input-output system in ROM at all? No current production OS uses it. It's 16-bit x86 code. Win95/98/ME might still need it in some modes, but for machines that come with XP or NT preloaded, why bother?

    Is it time for the BIOS to go the way of the BASIC interpreter provided in the original PC ROMS?