MSI mobo ditches Bios for EFI
Inside the future of PC set-up technology
Although the MSI P45D3 Platinum looks like a regular Core 2 motherboard, it breaks new ground. Out goes long-standing PC technology the Bios and in comes UEFI (Unified Extensible Firmware Interface) in its place.
UEFI is the successor to the Bios and seeks to take us away from the antiquated method of changing core computer settings using the keyboard to a more graphical world where we generally use the mouse to make adjustments instead.
MSI's P45D3 Platinum: wot no Bios?
Owners of Intel Macs are welcome to feel smug as their machines already use UEFI, though they rarely if ever need to access it.
Intel developed the original EFI in a bid to drag the PC out of the 1980s, as the business of changing the date, boot order of devices, or overclocking your PC using the Bios can be a horrible experience. It looks horribly dated and it can come as a nasty surprise when you look behind the veil and see the clunky mechanism that sits beneath your shiny copy of Windows 7 or Vista.
MSI's Click Bios: EFI plus garish colours
Abit has a handy animated guide to the Bios here, which saves us from the chore of taking loads of screenshots. If you have seen a Bios screen in the past ten years, this one will be instantly and horribly familiar. The low-resolution graphics are a throwback to the dark ages, and you have to navigate the text menus with the keyboard rather than the mouse.
COMMENTS
@Leo Waldock
Wow... this is the first article on any Register site I've started but could not finish. By page 2 I had to quit reading and ask what you problem with command line interfaces are? Did a keyboard beat you up when you were younger? Did a tab key kill your dog?
The hatred that you showed for the traditional BIOS interface, keyboard input and not capitalizing BIOS (it is an initialism you know?) makes me wonder if you have enough years under your belt to speak on this kind of topic.
efiGL, efiIPv6, efiMobileIP, efiGPS
with support for pixel/vertex/whatever else shaders, with Clippy The EFI Assistant, with JavaEFI(TM) edition for 3rd party applets support, with EFI indexing service ("The one that is supposed to make finding [options in EFI BIOS] quicker, that is controlled by interaction with a cartoon dog that you thought you had turned off") and embedded audio/video player with DRM support for even richier, nicier, beefier luser sexperience...
Graphical system setup?
Hmm... OK, I'll admit that some of it was CLI (I.E. the *configure command), but not all of it. The system - the Acorn Archimedes.
Pulling the computer out of the 1980's indeed! Heh!
Killing independent mobo-manufacturers
"Bios and in comes UEFI (Unified Extensible Firmware Interface) in its place."
Which just "happens" to be riddled with Intel & MS patents. How about killing competition in yet another sector?
It's totally irrelevant what's UEFI is at technical level, it's important who defines it (at will): Intel/MS. Easy way to kill indepedent mobo-manufacturers: You don't sell licence to them or ask a ridiculous price.
Yet another trick from dirty tricks department and most of the commenters buy it at face value. That's sad, tactics should be very easily seen with half brain.
It's all about money
"EFI’s major benefit is within its programming structure"
No, it's major benefit is money. For Intel, of course. I fail to see what are the benefits for MSI, unless Intel pays them to act as a sock puppet in this matter ... like some nice deep discount for bridge circuits, to a loyal customer, eh?
