Open source BIOS project
 

http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=13087

"Yousuf Khan" wrote in
message le.rogers.com...
http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=13087



Oh holy god in heaven... This is just one project I don't understand... It
seems to me as if BIOS costs aren't really driving up hardware development
costs significantly at all... What is the point? Just to be totally and
completely anti-establishment?

Carlo

"Carlo Razzeto" wrote in message
...
"Yousuf Khan" wrote in
message le.rogers.com...
http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=13087



Oh holy god in heaven... This is just one project I don't understand... It
seems to me as if BIOS costs aren't really driving up hardware development
costs significantly at all... What is the point? Just to be totally and
completely anti-establishment?

I don't know, perhaps it's to make the x86 BIOSes more friendly to Unixes?
You know to be able to access the BIOS setup screens through a serial
console, for example?

Yousuf Khan

On Sun, 14 Dec 2003 00:16:14 -0500, "Carlo Razzeto"
wrote:

"Yousuf Khan" wrote in
message le.rogers.com...
http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=13087



Oh holy god in heaven... This is just one project I don't understand... It
seems to me as if BIOS costs aren't really driving up hardware development
costs significantly at all... What is the point? Just to be totally and
completely anti-establishment?

I think the point is that the "establishment" BIOS mfrs (is there more than
one left ?) have been Borged and thrown their cap in with TCG, TCPA, DMCA,
Palladium etc. You *do* know who's running that little show??

Do you really want to have to get a "Web-ticky" just to be able to power up
your own computer?

Rgds, George Macdonald

"Just because they're paranoid doesn't mean you're not psychotic" - Who, me??

"Yousuf" == Yousuf Khan writes:

Yousuf "Carlo Razzeto" wrote in message
Yousuf ...
"Yousuf Khan"
wrote in message
le.rogers.com...
http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=13087



Oh holy god in heaven... This is just one project I don't
understand... It seems to me as if BIOS costs aren't really
driving up hardware development costs significantly at all... What
is the point? Just to be totally and completely
anti-establishment?

Yousuf I don't know, perhaps it's to make the x86 BIOSes more
Yousuf friendly to Unixes? You know to be able to access the BIOS
Yousuf setup screens through a serial console, for example?

That would be very nice option to have. That alone would be worth the
effort.

Alan

On a sunny day (Sun, 14 Dec 2003 07:49:31 -0500) it happened George Macdonald
wrote in
:

On Sun, 14 Dec 2003 00:16:14 -0500, "Carlo Razzeto"
wrote:

"Yousuf Khan" wrote in
message le.rogers.com...
http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=13087



Oh holy god in heaven... This is just one project I don't understand... It
seems to me as if BIOS costs aren't really driving up hardware development
costs significantly at all... What is the point? Just to be totally and
completely anti-establishment?

I think the point is that the "establishment" BIOS mfrs (is there more than
one left ?) have been Borged and thrown their cap in with TCG, TCPA, DMCA,
Palladium etc. You *do* know who's running that little show??

Do you really want to have to get a "Web-ticky" just to be able to power up
your own computer?

Rgds, George Macdonald
That may be one reason, I actually download the paper (is a link on that site)
and enjoyed reading it.
This thing seems to have its roots in large amounts of networked PCs that
did not have proper usable BIOS.
I like the line 'for al 960 PC write down BIOS setup values before BIOS upgrade,
then set it back....' that alone would be a very very good reason to write your own.
Will have to wait and see for the first DRM boxes if this helps in any way for that.
Note that Linux only needs the PCI tables to boot, and uses no real BIOS...
accesses the hardware directly.
Cool stuff, paper is very clearly written.
JP

"Just because they're paranoid doesn't mean you're not psychotic" - Who, me??

"Yousuf Khan" wrote in
message le.rogers.com...
http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=13087



Ok, I guess I feel the need to explain my position. So here goes... The
Motherboard market is extreamly competitive these days... So much so that
Teir 2 and 3 OEMs *HAVE* to diversify in order to survive (e.g. Shuttle SFF
barebones kit). Because of this, it is in the best interests of the MB OEMs
to realease good solid BIOS products that have sane default settings and
preform as advertised... This means that any WOL or WviaWeb feature should
be, by default, disabled and should truely disable any such feature while in
the disabled mode. If they don't then they risk getting their products
slammed on TechNews web sites message boards, such as Anandtech.com by
enthusiests... This is a big problem for OEMs, because while there may only
be a small number of true enthusiests, whenever some one thinks about
building their own they usually start checking out these message boards to
gauge how the "people that really know about these things" feel about a
product. If the "people that really know about these things" hate a
particular product, then chances are most other people will not buy the
product either. Actually I think I made a mistake here, if we're talking
about direct MB sales then probably we're talking about 99% enthusiests....
Anyway, with these things in mide, I don't see the point of any GPL Linux
BIOS or whatever they're calling it.

Carlo

"Carlo" == Carlo Razzeto writes:

Carlo "Yousuf Khan"
Carlo wrote in
Carlo message
Carlo le.rogers.com...
http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=13087



Carlo Ok, I guess I feel the need to explain my position. So here
Carlo goes... The Motherboard market is extreamly competitive these
Carlo days... So much so that Teir 2 and 3 OEMs *HAVE* to diversify
Carlo in order to survive (e.g. Shuttle SFF barebones kit). Because
Carlo of this, it is in the best interests of the MB OEMs to
Carlo realease good solid BIOS products that have sane default
Carlo settings and preform as advertised... This means that any WOL
Carlo or WviaWeb feature should be, by default, disabled and should
Carlo truely disable any such feature while in the disabled mode. If
Carlo they don't then they risk getting their products slammed on
Carlo TechNews web sites message boards, such as Anandtech.com by
Carlo enthusiests... This is a big problem for OEMs, because while
Carlo there may only be a small number of true enthusiests, whenever
Carlo some one thinks about building their own they usually start
Carlo checking out these message boards to gauge how the "people
Carlo that really know about these things" feel about a product. If
Carlo the "people that really know about these things" hate a
Carlo particular product, then chances are most other people will
Carlo not buy the product either. Actually I think I made a mistake
Carlo here, if we're talking about direct MB sales then probably
Carlo we're talking about 99% enthusiests.... Anyway, with these
Carlo things in mide, I don't see the point of any GPL Linux BIOS or
Carlo whatever they're calling it.

The point is that it can be done. That is one of the reasons that
Linux was started. It's good to see folks are working on this problem.
Until the project is completed no one has a clue how it will be used.

Later

Alan

Spam Me Please wrote:



The point is that it can be done. That is one of the reasons that
Linux was started. It's good to see folks are working on this problem.
Until the project is completed no one has a clue how it will be used.



Or why we may want it? Like if/when Paladium is implememted and the OE bios
makers don't provide any way to make a system appear as a "legacy" system
etc.

--

Stacey

Dear All,

I want to update the BIOS options, say Network Boot or Local Boot,
Changing the IRQ settings from WIndows XP itself.

Are there any API in VB/VC to do this.

Please provide your suggestions.

with regards,
Ranga.

stacey wrote in message ...
Spam Me Please wrote:



The point is that it can be done. That is one of the reasons that
Linux was started. It's good to see folks are working on this problem.
Until the project is completed no one has a clue how it will be used.



Or why we may want it? Like if/when Paladium is implememted and the OE bios
makers don't provide any way to make a system appear as a "legacy" system
etc.