Intel® Server Board Set SE8500HW4

System BIOS

10. System BIOS

The system BIOS is implemented as firmware that resides in flash ROM. It provides hardware- specific initialization algorithms, basic input/output (I/O) services, and standard Intel Server Board features. The flash ROM also contains firmware for certain embedded devices that are supplied by the device manufacturers and are not covered in this document.

The Intel® Server Board Set SE8500HW4 BIOS implementation is fully compliant to the Intel® Platform Innovation Framework for EFI architecture specifications. This Framework is a set of robust architectural interfaces that have been designed to accelerate the evolution of innovative, differentiated, platform designs. The Framework is Intel's recommended implementation of the EFI Specification for platforms based on all members of the Intel Architecture (IA) family.

A BIOS identification string is used to uniquely identify the revision of the BIOS being used on the system. The following is an example BIOS identification string:

SHW40.86B.P01.01.00.0001.031820051839

ƒBoard ID, ‘SHW40’ for Intel® Server Board Set SE8500HW4

ƒOEMID, ’86B’ is used for Intel Server Boards

ƒBuild type and version, ‘P01’ for production version 1

ƒMajor revision, ‘01’

ƒMinor revision, ‘00’

ƒBuild ID, ‘0001’

ƒBuild date and time, March 18, 2005 at 18:39

10.1 Advanced Memory Modes

The Intel® Server Board Set SE8500HW4 supports several new memory features that allow flexibility in performance, redundancy, and the ability to upgrade. The System BIOS can be configured for maximum performance, where memory is up to four-way interleaved; maximum compatibility, where memory can be hot-added; memory mirroring, where two or four boards are used to keep a copy of system memory; memory RAID, where four boards are used in a RAID4- like mode. Only one of these memory modes can be selected at one time, and the BIOS defaults to maximum performance mode. For the non-redundant modes, support is also included for memory sparing, where a portion of each Memory Board is reserved for failover.

Hot-replace means the user can replace a Memory Board with another Memory Board of identical total size. This operation is supported in memory RAID and memory mirroring modes.

Hot-add means the user can add a Memory Board to a previously unoccupied slot. This requires operating system support and is supported in maximum compatibility and memory mirroring modes.

Hot-upgrade means the user can replace an existing Memory Board with a Memory Board that contains more memory capacity. This requires operating system support and is supported by the memory RAID mode only.

Revision 1.0

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Intel order number D22893-001