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."

Comments

Well if Microsoft's involved....

[Anonymous Coward]

...it HAS to be bad, and an attempt to kill Linux.

That pretty much sums up the rest of the posts on this. Thanks, let's move on to the next story.

Re:Well if Microsoft's involved....

[IWorkForMorons]

...would this simply become a matter of the BIOS not allowing anything but "acceptable" OSes to boot?

Actually, they're called "trusted" OSes. And if you can't trust Microsoft, then who can you trust?

Re:Well if Microsoft's involved....

[gstevens]

You guys are all forgetting one thing: Intel is involved, and they have a lot invested in Linux. There are millions of x86 boxes out there running Linux instead of Sun, IBM, HP, etc boxes running some flavor of Unix. Intel knows this, and they like it. They're not stupid...

Re:Well if Microsoft's involved....

[Necron69]

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

OF?

[ChristTrekker]

Why not just use Open Firmware?

Re:OF?

[AKAImBatman]

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?!

Re:OF?

[squiggleslash]

My guess is that OpenFirmware is seen as cryptic. The deal with current BIOSes is that you hold down DEL and up comes a nice, friendly, menu where you can configure anything in the BIOS you want.

Whereas most people used to OpenFirmware know the default interface involves writing things like:

1 1 + dup dup + dup + + base !

...and that's just to get it to give you numbers in decimal.

Not that there aren't ways around this, obviously. For starters, there's no reason why DEL can't just bring up a GUI (or arrow-keys/ESC/Enter text interface), it doesn't have to bring up a command line. The point though is that OpenFirmware is seen as hard, it has a serious image problem.

Re:OF?

[cloudmaster]

That's a mature, existing standard. If consumer PCs were meant to have OF, they would've gotten it a long time ago. Therefore, a new "standard" should be developed and left undocumented.

So?

[Anonymous Coward]

So what happens when Intel and Microsoft decide they don't want anymore competition?

EFI sucks

[SuperQ]

I have several IA-64 systems at work. IA-64 requires EFI (part of the intel spec). It's a major pain in the ass.. you have to have a dos fat formated filesystem to store bootloaders, and other utilities as a primary partition.. besides the fact that they changed the normal dos partition format for EFI. I wish they would have just ported OpenBoot.

Re:EFI sucks

[zdzichu]

EFI sucks. Even Linus says so.

"Before loading your operating system"

[Hej]

I wonder if this new BIOS replacement will be designed based on the assumption that everybody is running the most current version of Windows.

What about AMD and Linux

[cybermancer]

When I see Microsoft and Intel working together I think of the platform lock-in of WinTel. This makes me wonder if they plan to have secret hooks offering advantages to their products. It will of course only be a matter of time for the likes of AMD and Linux to get up to speed, but sometimes a little time is all it takes to improve a market advantage through unfair practices.

can interact with EFI on a serial console?

[Anonymous Coward]

One thing I've always hated about the standard PC BIOS is that you need a keyboard, video and mouse (kvm) to configure the thing.

It'd be great if EFI initialised a serial console if detected that there was no KVM attached to the system. It'd be great for custom-made PC routers and servers on generic hardware running Linux or xBSD.

Re:can interact with EFI on a serial console?

[ultrapenguin]

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.

Of interest to console makers?

[Channard]

Particularly Microsoft themselves - if X-Box reaches a third iteration - I doubt this'll make X-Box 2. It may well allow them to put a stop to the old trick of soldering in a new bios chip that takes precedence over the onboard bios, thereby allowing the user to run all sorts of software, legal oses and programs and illegal pirate copies.

OpenFirmware

[AKAImBatman]

OpenFirmware is older than the hills, well tested, loved by all, and used on just about every machine EXCEPT Intel. Is anyone getting a sense of NIH syndrome?

Why?

[mekkab]

The excuse "WEll, current BIOS systems is just patch written upon patch written upon patch. ITs a mess."

But it works. Is an EFI system going to be markedly faster? When you tell me you are loading device drivers at the BIOS level, that tells me "No"- you are creeping the OS lower.

So whats the deal?
from Intel's EFI web site: Together, these provide a standard environment for booting an operating system and running pre-boot applications.

AHhhh! Running PRE-BOOT operations! This sounds like a lame way to shoe-horn in DRM or something similar onto my machine before it loads up.

Maybe I'm acting paranoid, but the slowest thing on my windows computer is WINDOWS, not the bios- that runs pretty fast.

Figures.

[alecto]

No mention at all in the article of what has to be one of the biggest reasons for the push to change the boot process: Digital Restrictions Management/Trusted Computing/Palladium/Next Generation Secure Computing Base. (Notice how the name gets changed every time it becomes obvious what it really is.)

Palladium and trusted computing

[cybermancer]

I noticed that the first PC to use EFI was a Gateway "Media Center" desktop. 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. Knowing the agenda for Palladiam and so called "Trusted Computing" (Who do you trust today?) I would really think twice before letting the likes of Microsoft and Intel (remember the P4 CPU ID?) rewrite my PC at the BIOS level.

The "competition" between Pheonix BIOS and EFI could be the beginning of the split between closed platform "Trusted" PC's and open platform PC's. I would not be surprised if EFI has provisions (at some future point) to require the OS is signed. That rules out Linux, BSD, etc.

Naturally they are doing all this for our best interests.

A change is really needed

[dido]

The original PC BIOS has incredibly remained basically unchanged since the days of the IBM PC, more than twenty years ago. We have all that legacy stuff in our PC's firmware that harks back to the days of MS-DOS and its limitations are being stretched to the breaking point by hacks and kluges (e.g. the disk size limits imposed by the real-mode BIOS calls). It would be nice to see it all go away for good.

On the other hand, it's Microsoft and Intel working together on this. This could very well be the next step towards the groundwork for Palladium, and more ugly DRM embedded into the lowest levels of PC hardware, that may well prevent anyone from running any operating system on commodity PC hardware besides that of Microsoft, among other baneful things. I'm not willing to bet that this new specification doesn't lay this type of groundwork in any way.

Re:So? - What do you mean?

[Markvs]

What do you mean when? I thought that decision was made back in 1994!

Registration-free spec

[morcheeba]

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.

Coming: The Year of the Infected Bios

[Alien54]

Seriously, the more complex you make the code in the bios, the more chance for security flaws built into the hardware itself.

Imagine the horror of having to patch a system by swapping out chips. I think I recall some old time viruses that basically screwed up the bios royally, and which were not easily cleanable, to one degree or another.

Remember, this design is supposed to be a feature, not a flaw.

Intel would never adopt OF

[Anonymous Coward]

Take ACPI, for example. If you take out the P of ACPI, and stick to the configuration features, you end up with something very similar to (some parts of) OF. A device name tree? OF has it. An intermediate language for device initialization? OF has it.

OF has only one difference to ACPI: OF works. Devices are made with valid machine-language drivers, so that the OS doesn't have to patch it upon boot, etc, etc, etc. Don't take me wrong, I really believed that ACPI would be great, but when people started implementing it, we saw what mess it became. It was one of the reasons I moved away of the x86 platform. It is just a bunch of hacks.

So why Intel created ACPI? Because while ACPI is also "open", Intel can control it. And Intel knows that while it keeps the power of defining standards, it will be the leading chip manufacturer: it helps to keep it top of mind in terms of consumer ICs.

For those who don't know what OF is, take a look at this.

Re:Intel would never adopt OF

[Burnon]

So, earlier someone posted a link to a summrary of a discussion on the Linux kernel list. An Intel guy pointed out some issues with the Openfirmware model that make some sense.

The way I read it is, hardware manufacturers want cheap products, and nobody wants to get locked in to supporting just one system architecture for an expansion card.

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, which isn't cheap, either. So as nasty as ACPI has been from an implementation point of view, it seems like it does some stuff that open firmware can't do. Same can be said for EFI. Seems like a hell of a problem to me - damned if you do, damned if you don't.

Now, that said, no arguments about the other fringe benefits Intel gets from pushing the standard.

P.S. To my mind, Linus' post on the issue in the thread seems like something that your average software dude (self included) might come up with. Come up with simple hardware specs that don't need ROM code, and standardize on THAT. I'd kill for that kind of utopia in my line of work. I don't work in PCs, I work in embedded systems. All the hardware guys talk about gaining a competitive edge by locking people into their proprietary hardware via a software interface that they control. Same thing going on here - it's not the software dudes in the industry that need convincing - it's the hardware and business dudes who aren't looking to the future, but to the next product.

Re:Intel would never adopt OF

[Kymermosst]

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.

Re:What about Apple?

[NineNine]

I agree. I see the same thing with Apple. Every time I buy a Macintosh, I have the hardest time getting W2K to run on them. Damn lock in.

No progress for ANYBODY!!!!

[t0ny]

So in other words, since its not specifically good for Linux it shouldnt be done? Everybody needs to understand a few things about PCs and the BIOS as well-

This stuff runs essentially the same as it did in the 80s. Sure, it uses more memory, bigger hard drives, etc, but its all just built from the same thing. Which leads into #2-

The solutions which were created to deal with things (such as the BIOS) were only intended, by their creators, to be temporary solutions until somebody designed something better. However, the IBM PC became a standard, and everything since then been built upon that foundation.

So, for the first time in decades, people are looking at the PC and trying to make it better. Why cant we have computers which boot up in seconds, rather than minutes? Why cant we have power saving which actually works? Those features, and many more, will only be possible with a redesign. The old way of doing things carries too much baggage.

Its sad, because I had always thought computer people always look for the best way to do things. Unfortunately, computer people are just like everyone else, and all too willing to accept the status quo.

Re:No progress for ANYBODY!!!!

[jejones]

So in other words, since its not specifically good for Linux it shouldnt be done?

That's an inaccurate paraphrase. The concern, and a valid one, IMHO, is that MS will attempt to use this to lock out competition. IOW, the question is whether this is going to be designed to be specifically bad for Linux.

Re:No progress for ANYBODY!!!!

[Wise Dragon]

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.

The real scoop

[salesgeek]

Whats the big deal here? Everyone knows bios is obsolete. It doesn't start with the all powerful internet letters "e" or "i". It doesn't have an embedded web browser. It can't play downloadable games. It even sounds all 80's - logo, DOS, bios, ROM... Not sexy. So here's the marketing redesign:

* Start with a leter "e" or "i". "e" is more powerful because it evokes environmentalist images of birds singing, clean water, air, beaches. I is too industrial... Let's go with E
* No StudlyCaps - Too 90s
* Avoid anything that sounds like a computer part from the movie Tron. To 80s.
* Add features that journalists want: pre-os software load (we don't want the OPERATING SYSTEM RUNNING THE COMPUTER), DRM, Support for hard drive loaded modules, and OnStar w/GPS for convenient assistance for law enforcement.

EFI is useful

[dlapine]

If you run ia64 (all 5 of us :) ) you already run EFI. For some of you out there who may not have actually seen EFI in action, I'd thought I provide some small examples of what it looks like.

EFI does a running check of the hardware that it understands, drivers for which were provided by the Motherboard maker.

Here's a snapshot of the EFI SCAN on my INTEL Tiger4 system.:

EFI version 1.10 [14.61] Build flags: EFI64 Running on Intel(R) Itanium(R) 2 processor EFI_DEBUG
EFI IA-64 SDV/FDK (BIOS CallBacks) [Wed Jan 1 23:33:30 2003] - INTEL
Cache Enabled. This image MainEntry is at address 000000007FA02000
Searching for EFI 1.1 SCSI driver....
Scsi(Pun0,Lun0) MAXTOR ATLASU320_18_SCAB120 (320 MBytes/sec)
Scsi(Pun1,Lun0) MAXTOR ATLASU320_73_SCAB120 (320 MBytes/sec)
Scsi(Pun2,Lun0) MAXTOR ATLASU320_73_SCAB120 (320 MBytes/sec)
Scsi(Pun6,Lun0) ESG-SHV
Invoking PxeDhcp4 protocol to obtain IP address.

At the end of this, I get a menu that I can manually select from (cursor up and down), or let it automatically try the options(which can be modified to suit the user's needs). Here's a snapsnot:

EFI Boot Manager ver 1.10 [14.61]

Please select a boot option

Network Boot/Pci(1|0|0)/Mac(0007E9D8147A)
Linux
Floppy/Pci(1F|1)/Ata(Primary,Slave)
CD/DVD ROM/Pci(1F|1)/Ata(Primary,Master)
EFI Shell [Built-in]
Boot option maintenance menu

Use ^ and v to change option(s). Use Enter to select an option

As you can see, EFI has detected the network card, a bootable linux partition, the floppy (LS240 in this case), and the cdrom drive. Anything you can detect, you can boot off from.

The EFI shell option brings you into a shell. Once in the shell, you can easily switch to another filesystem by executing a changefilesystem command, similar to msdos:

fs1:

The shell prompt (for filesystem 0, which is the first filesystem EFI finds, whether its on a floppy, a cdrom, a harddrive, usb key, whatever)

fs0:\>

The shell looks like a dos shell, but runs commands that the motherboard manufacturer includes, such as "edit" "ls" "cat" "cp" "mount" and others. These commands live in ROM.

EFI understands the FAT32 filesystem and can perform operations on files living there including editing. EFI can access any FAT32 on any device EFI has a built-in driver for, and any device that the user can obtain an EFI driver for.

Another nice feature is that you can create a partition on the disk that efi will use to hold more commands, or updated commands, or drivers for newer hardware. These extra commands when then be available to you at boot time.

To the user, EFI looks almost like an built-in mini OS that understands enough of the hardware to give you several boot options, as well as the ability to manipulate files on the devices it sees.

I've seen no evidence of DRM support, or OS lock-in, but that certainly doesn't rule out the possibility. The thing is, EFI is enough of a standard that the user might have the possibility of replacing the stock EFI with some other version to meet their personal needs. This would certainly put us ahead of where we are with current vendor lockin on motherboard bios.

Re:Microsoft Logic

[Billly Gates]

"Seriously folks, we're not just gonna wake up one day and find that all our favorite OS's have been outlawed."

You know, back in 99 I heard a similiar argument by the vast majority of slashdotters in regards to a new propossed law called the DMCA.

I myself called RMS and the EFF, lunitics and mentioned it here in regards to it. I got modded +4 informitive. My responses were on the line of ya, like they are going to sue innocent software developers who want to watch DVD's or those who bad mouth a company.

Come on get real. The dmca will never be used to cancel free speech.....

Well, I was shocked to find out not only was RMS and the EFF right but it was far far more worse then imagined.

Why can't I watch my own dvd's?

You know what? What would MS and the MPAA do if I wrote a patch for Lilo or grub that uses the ultra secret boot signature? I would get thrown in the federal "slam me in the ass" prison!

I just posted another post mentioning how Linux will be still supported for some time like OS/2 is from many bios's. But still I am extremely cautous.

ALso look at soyo with the ACPI installed by default on some of their motherboards due to a bug. Linux and FreeBSD at the time could not use ACPI properly with it and it caused a major headache. The same could happen if pallidium is on by default so manufactors could avoid headaches with Linux support. I doubt this but its certainly possible.