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Writing an End to the Bio of BIOS?
An anonymous reader writes "Intel and Microsoft are gearing up to move toward the first major overhaul of the innermost workings of the personal computer. The companies will begin promoting a technology specification called EFI (Extensible Firmware Interface) as a new system for starting up a PC's hardware before its operating system begins loading."
because we're not all using mac's. hello. welcome to the real world.
Exactly. Because most of us are using UltraSparcs and other Unix machines that use OpenFirmware. Hello! McFly?!
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
The download page requires a fake name and email, but you can skip that and get the latest version (1.10-001) here. (Total karma whore link: EFI homepage)
The license isn't actually too bad - it just says that if you provide them feedback, then you also grant them the right to implement your idea.
HIV Crosses Species Barrier... into Muppets
Most server machines support BIOS over serial port. And not your most expensive ones, either.
I have some low-end NEC servers, and the BIOS (by default) comes configured to check for a console on serial port, and appear there, instead of the primary monitor.
And this has been around for quite a while.
What's to stop SCO from butting their ass in and requiring a change in the spec that only allows approved operating systems to run in OF?
What's to stop all the actual OF members from either voting SCO down or ignoring their spec changes? Like it or not, SCO/Caldera *used* to be a reasonable company in the computing world. It should then come as no surprise that their on many technology standard boards. But when you consider the fact that they are probably the only OpenFirmware member that doesn't have an implementation (Their market is Intel after all), their ideas probably won't carry much weight.
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
Those viruses (Win32.CIH, for one) DID attack Flash BIOSes. They rendered the system unbootable (unless there was an emergency backup on the mobo), so that the chip had to be thrown in a running box and flashed.
I don't know what Windows XP is like booting up but I have 2 pretty much identical machines one of which runs Win2k and one of which runs Mandrake 9.2
Quite often I turn them both on at the same time and I can always log into Gnome around 30-40 seconds faster than I can log into Win2K.
Check out the link in my sig. If I am speculating correctly, then Intel will be manufacturing processors that will come with oodles of NVRAM. Oddly, Microsoft is launching a version of Windows called Elements to go along with Intel's upcoming "stackable" Pentium 5. While the market believes that the stacking design is for the addition of 64-bit expansion, I believe it is for NVRAM expansion.
Elements will reside completely in NVRAM. Not only will this allow for great enhancements to power consumption, it also eliminates the need for a BIOS.
Life is the leading cause of death in America.
For those who do not know, Media Center is Microsoft's first attempt at highly integration of DRM (Digital Rights Management) into the core functionality of the OS.
???
The DRM hooks may be present in XP Media Center Edition, but that doesn't mean you have to use them. I've been running the OS for weeks, and haven't even had to sign up for a Passport.
My HP Media Center PC even came with software to convert video files captured by MS'S PVR codec into free-and-clear MPEG's.
Given the bias on Slashdot, I'm assuming most of you don't know that Linux already runs on Itanium boxes with EFI. All of HP's Itanium boxes have EFI on them, so it doesn't have anything to with banning the use of Linux.
- Necron69
It's already been designed, it already works with linux, and it's pretty neat. Right now you have to buy an Itanium machine to use it, though.
With something like openfirmware, apparently you have to have a ROM big enough to contain valid code that can run on both IA-32 and IA-64 and PPC, etc., or you end up with things like PC-only and Mac-only cards...
Nope, plug-in drivers on Open Firmware compatible cards are written in FCODE, which is a Forth bytecode language.
Completely machine independent.
The article says that Open Firmware was considered, but they didn't want to drop ACPI.
Frankly, Open Firmware has a lot of features you are just never going to see on home machines/cheap server boxes as long as Intel and MS are in charge. I'd rather have OF on my server boxes, hence why I chose a Sun machine.
"Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives" should be a convenience store, not a government agency.