8

SYSTEM BIOS

8.1Introduction

The System Basic Input/Output System (BIOS) of the computer is a collection of machine language programs stored as firmware in read-only memory (ROM). The system BIOS includes such functions as Power-On Self Test (POST), PCI device initialization, Plug 'n Play support, power management activities, and the Setup utility. The firmware contained in the system BIOS ROM supports the following operating systems and specifications:

■DOS 6.2, Windows 2000, XP, and Vista (Home and Professional versions)

■Windows NT 4.0 (SP6 required for PnP support)

■OS/2 ver 2.1 and OS/2 Warp

■SCO Unix

■DMI 2.1

■Alert Standard Format (ASF) 2.0

■ACPI and OnNow

■SMBIOS 2.5

■BIOS Boot Specification 1.01

■Enhanced Disk Drive Specification 3.0

■“El Torito” Bootable CD-ROM Format Specification 1.0

■ATAPI Removeable Media Device BIOS Specification 1.0

■Serial ATA Advanced Host Controller Interface (AHCI) 1.2

The BIOS firmware is contained in a flash ROM component. The runtime portion of the BIOS resides in a 128KB block from E0000h to FFFFFh.

This chapter includes the following topics:

■ROM flashing (8.2)

■Boot functions (8.3)

■Client management functions (8.4)

■SMBIOS support (8.5)

■USB legacy support (8.6)

■Management functions (8.7)

 

Technical Reference Guide

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