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A Web Browser in Your BIOS?

Posted by timothy on from the smart-dumb-smart-dumb-terminal dept.

Anonymous Coward points to this article on xbitlabs.com, which begins "At the recently held Computex show in Taipei Phoenix Technology Company introduced its new FirstBIOS based on Linux. Among the major advantages of this product, they mentioned such things as PC wake from different standby modes and integrated means of rapid PC recovery in case of failure." That's not all, though -- the article goes on to say that "the most remarkable thing is that you will be able to get access to Internet directly from this interface either via the traditional modem or local network. In this case the data will be stored in NTFS, FAT32 and ext2 file systems. According to Phoenix, all these features fit into 16Mbit Flash memory."

4 of 199 comments (clear)

  1. poor MS by sysrequest · · Score: 3, Funny

    We are complaining about computers being bundled with MS Windows. If this turns into a standard bios, because of it's cool features etc., I wonder how Microsoft feels not being able to get rid of Linux without destroying the BIOS.

    Furthermore, if the BIOS has web browsing capabilities, and maybe even e-mailing capabilities, it may be the perfect [BI]OS for some people. There may not be a need for yet another OS to run on top of it.

    But yea, a bit bloated for being "just" a BIOS, isn't it? As long as it's rock solid it shouldn't matter though.

  2. Astounding breakthrough! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    Why, within year we might be able to boot from a network server! Or copy software from a network server! They could call it "TFTP"!

  3. SWEET! Just imagine..... by xeeno · · Score: 3, Funny

    Now 31337 h4ck3rZ can own your bios too.

  4. Re:Bloat by jx100 · · Score: 3, Funny

    I just upgraded my dad to a 1.6 GHz P4

    that must've made quite a mess..