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  • General Question About BIOS and UEFI

    From tb@21:1/5 to All on Tue Jul 27 14:40:03 2021
    Newbie question...

    If I were to purchase some kind of mainstream desktop PC without any OS preinstalled and if I were to boot up such PC and press F2 repeatedly,
    would I find myself in the BIOS screen or the UEFI screen?

    Or maybe the UEFI screen is available only if Microsoft Windows is
    installed?

    --
    tb

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  • From David W. Hodgins@21:1/5 to nospam@example.invalid on Tue Jul 27 13:24:34 2021
    On Tue, 27 Jul 2021 10:40:03 -0400, tb <nospam@example.invalid> wrote:

    Newbie question...

    If I were to purchase some kind of mainstream desktop PC without any OS preinstalled and if I were to boot up such PC and press F2 repeatedly,
    would I find myself in the BIOS screen or the UEFI screen?

    Or maybe the UEFI screen is available only if Microsoft Windows is
    installed?

    It will be a uefi screen on anything produced in the last decade or so. The uefi
    firmware is stored on the motherboard, not on a disk drive. The software is a customized version of uefi firmware developed by or for the motherboard manufacturer.

    Note that different systems use different keys, so check the manual. It isn't always f2.

    Regards, Dave Hodgins

    --
    Change dwhodgins@nomail.afraid.org to davidwhodgins@teksavvy.com for
    email replies.

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    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Tom Niget@21:1/5 to All on Tue Jul 27 19:23:06 2021
    Le 27/07/2021 à 16:40, tb a écrit :
    Newbie question...

    If I were to purchase some kind of mainstream desktop PC without any OS preinstalled and if I were to boot up such PC and press F2 repeatedly,
    would I find myself in the BIOS screen or the UEFI screen?

    Or maybe the UEFI screen is available only if Microsoft Windows is
    installed?



    UEFI *is* the BIOS, in a way. The UEFI software is the bit of code that
    your computer runs when you power it on, the same way the BIOS did on
    older computers. Some UEFI implementations support the CSM which allow
    older software relying on legacy BIOS interrupts to work properly.

    A 2021 mainstream desktop PC doesn't have any BIOS code similar to what
    you'd find on an older computer, and pressing F2 would open the UEFI
    firmware setup screen.

    Windows kind of blurred the line between firmware and operating system
    for the average user since most computers sold since 2012 that ship with Windows >= 8 don't allow entering the firmware by pressing a key at
    startup, forcing you to boot into Windows, to enter an "Advanced
    Startup" menu, and to click "UEFI Firmware settings" from there, which
    is really dumb given that a lot of times you want to enter the firmware
    because your OS crashed and you need to reinstall it and boot from
    another device.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From MikeS@21:1/5 to David W. Hodgins on Wed Jul 28 08:26:40 2021
    On 27/07/2021 18:24, David W. Hodgins wrote:
    On Tue, 27 Jul 2021 10:40:03 -0400, tb <nospam@example.invalid> wrote:

    Newbie question...

    If I were to purchase some kind of mainstream desktop PC without any OS
    preinstalled and if I were to boot up such PC and press F2 repeatedly,
    would I find myself in the BIOS screen or the UEFI screen?

    Or maybe the UEFI screen is available only if Microsoft Windows is
    installed?

    It will be a uefi screen on anything produced in the last decade or so.
    The uefi
    firmware is stored on the motherboard, not on a disk drive. The software
    is a
    customized version of uefi firmware developed by or for the motherboard manufacturer.

    Note that different systems use different keys, so check the manual. It
    isn't
    always f2.

    Regards, Dave Hodgins

    As already said it will be UEFI but generally that will have a legacy
    mode option. Legacy emulates the original BIOS allowing an old OS which
    knows nothing about UEFI to be installed.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Paul@21:1/5 to MikeS on Wed Jul 28 06:51:51 2021
    MikeS wrote:
    On 27/07/2021 18:24, David W. Hodgins wrote:
    On Tue, 27 Jul 2021 10:40:03 -0400, tb <nospam@example.invalid> wrote:

    Newbie question...

    If I were to purchase some kind of mainstream desktop PC without any OS
    preinstalled and if I were to boot up such PC and press F2 repeatedly,
    would I find myself in the BIOS screen or the UEFI screen?

    Or maybe the UEFI screen is available only if Microsoft Windows is
    installed?

    It will be a uefi screen on anything produced in the last decade or
    so. The uefi
    firmware is stored on the motherboard, not on a disk drive. The
    software is a
    customized version of uefi firmware developed by or for the
    motherboard manufacturer.

    Note that different systems use different keys, so check the manual.
    It isn't
    always f2.

    Regards, Dave Hodgins

    As already said it will be UEFI but generally that will have a legacy
    mode option. Legacy emulates the original BIOS allowing an old OS which
    knows nothing about UEFI to be installed.

    Except Intel has waved a magic wand, and declared that "legacy mode
    shall go away, no more CSM". Which means newly purchased equipment
    will be stuck in a UEFI-only world.

    Then your setting choices will be "Secure Boot ON or OFF" and
    a page full of "Machine Key settings".

    Just as someone waved a magic wand and said "no more VGA"
    a couple of years ago. Purchase converter dongles
    (HDMI to VGA and DP to VGA) while you still can.

    Paul

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