Re: BIOS Autodetection Design

[M Carling]

Erin R. Kern wrote:
> The tables for all of the chipsets that you want to support would fill
> any BIOS EEPROM on the market and you haven't even written one line of
> code yet.

The objective is not to write OpenBIOS such that (in practice) a single
compiled image can boot any chipset. Rather, the autodetect objective is
that a set of chipsets may be chosen at compile time from which the image
is about to boot. Thus, for example, a MB manufacturer could compile a
BIOS such that one image would work for all the MBs that they manufacture.

Do you think this has any merit, Eric?

M

BIOS Autodetection Design

[Eric R. Kern]

M Carling wrote:
> The objective is not to write OpenBIOS such that (in practice) a single
> compiled image can boot any chipset. Rather, the autodetect objective is
> that a set of chipsets may be chosen at compile time from which the image
> is about to boot. Thus, for example, a MB manufacturer could compile a
> BIOS such that one image would work for all the MBs that they manufacture.
>
> Do you think this has any merit, Eric?

This is a standard practice used in today's BIOS and it definately has merit.
The big BIOS vendors such as AMI and Phoenix generally sell a standard BIOS to
MB manufacturers.  However, this BIOS generally needs to be customized by the
motherboard manufacturer to run with a particular motherboard.

Is the objective of OpenBIOS to provide source code to motherboard
manufacturers that they can modify and customize for their boards or is it to
provide a BIOS that will run on an individuals PC?

Eric R. Kern

BIOS Autodetection Design

[Matthew Sullivan]

"Eric R. Kern" wrote:
> M Carling wrote:
> > The objective is not to write OpenBIOS such that (in practice) a single
> > compiled image can boot any chipset. Rather, the autodetect objective is
> > that a set of chipsets may be chosen at compile time from which the image
> > is about to boot. Thus, for example, a MB manufacturer could compile a
> > BIOS such that one image would work for all the MBs that they manufacture.
> >
> > Do you think this has any merit, Eric?
>
> This is a standard practice used in today's BIOS and it definately has merit.
> The big BIOS vendors such as AMI and Phoenix generally sell a standard BIOS to
> MB manufacturers.  However, this BIOS generally needs to be customized by the
> motherboard manufacturer to run with a particular motherboard.
>
> Is the objective of OpenBIOS to provide source code to motherboard
> manufacturers that they can modify and customize for their boards or is it to
> provide a BIOS that will run on an individuals PC?

Both I beleive, the end-user will require a custom bios for themselves, and the
manufaturers a BIOS that works on all their current PC range.

My thoughts are that the target is the home/business user.

With the aspect that with manufacturers visibility people will use it without the
stigma of the early Linux days ie: it's written by a bunch of hackers, it isn't
much use for us.....

Just my 2 pence worth...

Yours

Mickey