[JnC]

I am trying to learn more about what I've have here with a mini 10v running OS X.

I am unfamiliar with BIOS. Are they similar to Apple system prefs?
When I researched BIOS online, it appears that the options are similar to those I'm familiar with in system prefs.

Does one take precedence over the other in the mini?
For example, I've read here about changing the BIOS boot order to USB (with USB legacy support enabled) if one wants to boot from an external drive. Do you also have to change the startup disk choice in syst prefs as well or is that overridden by BIOS? Same for all those sleep/hibernate power management settings?

Just trying to learn here,
J

[holmes4]

All you ever wanted to know about BIOS:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BIOS

BIOS is independent of OS - it's the hardware's internal operating system. It's in the BIOS settings that you establish initial boot order.

[JnC]

Originally Posted by holmes4

All you ever wanted to know about BIOS:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BIOS

BIOS is independent of OS - it's the hardware's internal operating system. It's in the BIOS settings that you establish initial boot order.

Yes, that's more than I ever wanted to know! I was reading How Stuff Works, especially this:
http://computer.howstuffworks.com/bios3.htm
A lot of those settings looked like system prefs.

What you say helps me understand - BIOS is, as it were, deeper in than system prefs and that's why I have to go here to change things.

(btw, accessing BIOS for a PC neophyte, but long-time Mac-user, was less than easy; on our mini we must have tried a dozen times to hit the function key when told in mechdrew's install instructions - it only worked if we hit the function key before the dell logo appeared just after we powered up.)

J

[reflex]

BIOS exists outside and before OSs and bootloaders. It's built-in to a chip on the motherboard, so it works even with no storage device or OS installed. It commonly includes low-level settings, like boot device, RAM timings, etc.

Intel Macs have essentially the same thing, EFI. EFI is the next-gen of BIOS. So far, EFI has mostly been used in Intel Macs, but normal PCs will be switching to it in the near future. And apparently, Apple exposes very few settings, and thanks to their tight hardware-software integration, the settings are accessible via OSX.

But on a hackintosh, you need to deal with BIOS directly and I presume OSX setting changes won't affect it.

---------- Post added at 09:54 PM ---------- Previous post was at 09:52 PM ----------

Originally Posted by JnC

(btw, accessing BIOS for a PC neophyte, but long-time Mac-user, was less than easy; on our mini we must have tried a dozen times to hit the function key when told in mechdrew's install instructions - it only worked if we hit the function key before the dell logo appeared just after we powered up.)

J

I think holding down the key also works. Or you can just hit it a thousand times, like I usually do

[JnC]

Thanks, reflex, that helps clear things up.
J