UEFI vs BIOS

[Rebelattack]

I recently installed a new mobo and saw the option for booting from a DVD or other drive but also with UEFI in front of it. I read a bit about the UEFI on wikipedia, which talked mostly about pre OS and a lot of stuff I dont understand , but now I wanna know what is the difference between them and are there any plusses for either after OS installation?

[jakkuh_t]

UEFI is an interface. It can be implemented on top of a traditional BIOS or on top of non-BIOS implementations.

• As we all know that BIOS is important part for accessing boot option. So now UEFI will do that? How?
  

• How would I know that I'm booting with UEFI not with BIOS?
  
  

If you have a UEFI-compatible motherboard, in the boot menu, you will get two options: boot a device normally or boot it in UEFI: 

 

 

 

• So what is the real different in the "boot with BIOS" and "boot with UEFI"?
  
  

There are many differences:

• UEFI on Gigabyte GA-EP45-DS3 initializes in 11 seconds versus BIOS in 19 seconds.
  
• UEFI defines a similar OS-firmware interface like BIOS but is not specific to any processor architecture. BIOS is specific to the Intel x86 processor architecture, as it relies on the 16-bit "real mode" interface supported by x86 processors.
  

 

Source: superuser.com

[Rheinwasser]

if you install your windows in uefi mode it doesnt have to search for the bootloader anymore so it's a little faster.

but dont quote me on that.

[Opcode]

UEFI mode is only beneficial if your hardware supports it. The only main benefit is a faster booting system. Otherwise it's essentially the same thing as a BIOS in that respect except providing a graphical user interface and mouse support.

[GoodBytes]

UEFI replaces the BIOS setup as we know, making it far smarter than the age old system of before (80's tech ?)

The way BIOS works is that it detects your system hardware, check teh boot sector, and start the OS. The OS then has no idea of your hardware, and re-do the system hardware checks. UEFI is far smarter, it can scan for hardware all at the same time, and can have hardware feed it it's information, and skips the useless (in my opinion) memory check process. In addition, it support drive partition larger than 2TB, support GPT partitioning table, has basic GPU support allowing for a rich user experience on the setup screen, including mouse and touch screen support. In addition, All the information of the hardware it has can be fed to the OS, so teh supported OS doesn't need to re-check all your hardware once again.

UEFI, mixed with Windows 8 tricks to boot quicker, and more lean, allows you to boot your computer in sec from the "click" sound from your power button, to your desktop fully loaded (with a decent performing system, and fast SSD on SATA-3)

If you are not getting such speed with Windows 8 (or faster), despite the SSD, and hardware specs, then it's because you have a hardware that is not supported, or not configured to do such. Be sure that your SDD is on GPT "mode" and not MBR before installing Windows 8, and that your graphics card firmware/vBIOS has been updated to be GOP ready and CSM (in the UEFI setup screen) is disabled.

[Rebelattack]

Thanks for the info . So one last thing as they talk about drive partitions and 2 TB drives, does that part mean that BIOS can not handle HDD bigger then 2 TB or does that part mean something else? Also I already had a clickable BIOS before installing any OS but I think I installed it the BIOS way or did I install UEFI without knowing it?

[GoodBytes]

You can have a 80TB HDD, but the max partition you can use is 2TB under the BIOS.

So in this case you can have multiple 2TB or less partitions in your 80TB. But you can't have the whole drive as 1 partition (meaning: no partitions. IE: you can't have C:\ being more than 2TB big).

Now the reality of things, is that they are tricks that motherboard manufactures and HDD makers do use to support 3TB partitions, and for those released when UEFI was at its infancy, supported as big as you want, by doing a hack where they use a hybrid BIOS/UEFI thing. But ignoring those, you can't.

My motherboard does this hybrid thing, and setting it up to support 3+TB drives, such setup made the boot process even longer when I tried it. Like visibly slower. So I don't think it's worth doing unless desperate.