What exactly are EFI and UEFI that replace traditional BIOS?
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The traditional blue and white BIOS interface can be said to have grown up with many players. However, when Intel released the Sandy Bridge architecture processor, it was time for the traditional BIOS to say goodbye to us. The EFI and UEFI with graphical interfaces quickly replaced the traditional BIOS and became the standard configuration of many motherboards. Today we will talk about this EFI and UEFI that changed the tradition. Such traditional BIOS interface has now said goodbye to us. What are EFI and UEFI? EFI is the abbreviation of Extensible Firmware Interface, which is an upgrade solution advocated by Intel to replace BIOS in PC-like systems. Compared with traditional BIOS, EFI builds the system through modularization, C language parameter stack passing method and dynamic linking. It is easier to implement than BIOS and has stronger fault tolerance and error correction characteristics. UEFI is Unified Extensible Firmware Interface, which is developed based on the EFI 1.10 standard, but the owner is not Intel, but an international organization called Unified EFI Form. UEFI is a standard that describes a type interface in detail, allowing the PC to load the operating system from the pre-boot operating environment. UEFI uses a graphical interface, which is very different from the traditional BIOS. It should be noted that although EFI and UEFI are called differently, they are essentially the same. Since the official release of the EFI 1.02 standard on December 12, 2000, EFI has always existed as an advanced standard to replace the traditional BIOS. The ownership is in the hands of Intel. In 2007, Intel handed over the improvement and perfection of the EFI standard to the Unified EFI Form. The EFI standard that came out later was officially renamed UEFI to distinguish it. Therefore, UEFI is an improvement and development of EFI. In fact, the former has made improvements in UGA protocol, SCSI transmission, USB control and I/O devices compared with the latter, and has also added new content such as network application interface, X64 binding, and service binding. In addition, it is not only Intel that participates in the development of the UEFI standard, but also AMD, Apple, Dell, HP, IBM, Lenovo, Microsoft and other leading companies. Therefore, UEFI has better performance in compatibility and is more versatile. What are the differences and advantages of UEFI compared to traditional BIOS? Compared with traditional BIOS, UEFI supports new hardware far more than the other. The best manifestation of this is that we can use a hard disk of more than 2.2TB as a boot disk under UEFI, while under traditional BIOS, such a large-capacity hard disk can only be used as a data disk without the help of third-party software. UEFI with a graphical interface allows you to view various data more intuitively. In addition, UEFI has a built-in graphics driver function, which can provide a high-resolution graphical interface. After entering, users can use the mouse to set and adjust just like in Windows, which is simpler and faster to operate. At the same time, because UEFI uses a modular design, it can be logically divided into two parts: hardware control and software management. The former belongs to standardized general settings, while the latter is a programmable open interface. Therefore, motherboard manufacturers can use the latter's open interface to implement a variety of rich functions on their own products, including screenshots, data backup, hardware fault diagnosis, and UEFI online upgrades without the operating system. The functions are more and stronger than traditional BIOS. Of course, the advantages of UEFI over traditional BIOS are not just the above points. In fact, it also includes the following features: - 99% of the coding is done in C language; - No longer using interrupts and hardware port operations, but using Driver/Protocol; - Will not support X86 real mode, but directly use Flat mode; - No longer output pure binary code, but Removable Binary Drivers mode; - The startup of the operating system is no longer calling INT 19H interrupt, but directly using Protocol/Device Path; - More convenient for third-party development; However, these features are of no practical significance to ordinary users. They are more for developers, so the relevant content will not be described in detail this time. What are the main components of UEFI? The relationship between the various components of UEFI Now let's go a little deeper and look at the main components of UEFI. UEFI is mainly composed of the initialization module, driver execution environment, driver, compatibility support module, UEFI application and GUID disk partition. The initialization module and driver execution environment are the basis for the operation of UEFI, and are usually integrated into the flash memory chip of the motherboard, which is similar to the traditional BIOS. When the computer is turned on, the initialization module is executed first, which is responsible for the initialization of the CPU, motherboard chip and storage device. After completion, the driver execution environment, namely Driver Execution Environment, is loaded. After DXE is loaded, UEFI can further load the hardware UEFI driver. DXE loads drivers for various buses and devices by enumeration, and these drivers can be placed anywhere in the system, as long as they can be enumerated correctly in order. The hardware UEFI driver is generally placed in the UEFI dedicated partition of the hard disk. As long as the system loads this hard disk correctly, the corresponding driver can be read and applied normally. Therefore, with the support of DXE, even if players add new hardware to the PC, as long as there is a corresponding UEFI driver, UEFI can easily provide support. This is something that the traditional BIOS with almost no expansion capabilities cannot match. It is precisely because of this ability that UEFI can easily support various network devices and connect to the Internet, thereby realizing the function of online upgrading UEFI without entering the system. The compatibility support module is to allow operating systems that do not have UEFI boot function to successfully complete boot and start in the UEFI environment. This compatibility support module will provide UEFI with system services similar to traditional BIOS, so as to ensure that UEFI can have a good transition in technology. The GUID disk partition is a disk partition structure introduced in the UEFI standard. Compared with the traditional MBR partition, the GUID disk partition breaks through the limitation of the former that only allows 4 primary partitions, and the partition type is also changed to what we often call GPT partition. What are the disadvantages of UEFI? Although UEFI has basically replaced the traditional BIOS, it is not only advantages but also disadvantages. Compared with the traditional BIOS, UEFI has greatly improved hardware compatibility, but in terms of its own security, it may be inferior to the traditional BIOS. First of all, the main program and code of UEFI are integrated into the flash memory chip on the motherboard. If the chip fails, the computer cannot start normally, which is basically the same as the traditional BIOS. However, since the UEFI program is written in a high-level language, it is more vulnerable to virus attacks than the traditional BIOS written in assembly language, and the program code is also easier to be rewritten. Therefore, although UEFI has been widely used, its security and stability still need to be improved. As a winner of Toutiao's Qingyun Plan and Baijiahao's Bai+ Plan, the 2019 Baidu Digital Author of the Year, the Baijiahao's Most Popular Author in the Technology Field, the 2019 Sogou Technology and Culture Author, and the 2021 Baijiahao Quarterly Influential Creator, he has won many awards, including the 2013 Sohu Best Industry Media Person, the 2015 China New Media Entrepreneurship Competition Beijing Third Place, the 2015 Guangmang Experience Award, the 2015 China New Media Entrepreneurship Competition Finals Third Place, and the 2018 Baidu Dynamic Annual Powerful Celebrity. |
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