* The Unified Extensible Firmware Interface Forum
Last week a variety of vendors – including IBM, HP and Dell – formed the Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI) Forum to define a model to replace the basic input/output system (BIOS) in today’s PCs and servers.
The UEFI specification is intended to overcome problems with the BIOS, first implemented in the original IBM PC in 1981.
“The BIOS has this horribly crusty old legacy that literally dates back to the first IBM PC,” says Gordon Haff, senior analyst with Illuminata. “It’s been extended and patched, but it’s still basically designed for a 1980-vintage desktop PC. It’s still got a lot of legacy baggage – such as the way video is handled.”
The BIOS controls the flow of data between the operating system and devices such as hard disks and video adapters in the pre-boot state. It determines whether all these devices are operational before it loads the operating system.
UEFI would be a model for the interface between an operating system and the PC’s or server’s firmware. The information in the interface would consist of tables that contain boot-related and platform-related information.
UEFI would not be specific to any processor, while the BIOS was designed for Intel’s x86 architecture. Nor would UEFI completely replace the BIOS. Other firmware will still be needed to implement the Power On Self Test (POST) and Setup.
The United EFI Forum is a non-profit organization that also counts AMD, American Megatrends and Microsoft among its members.
The original EFI specification is still copyrighted by Intel, which has contributed it to the Unified EFI Forum to evolve it further. Servers and PCs that use the EFI 1.10 specification are already on the market. Interested readers can find out more at http://www.uefi.org
