The BIOS
Note
The following sections apply only to FreeBSD running on x86 (Intel) hardware. Although the startup process on Alpha systems is similar, some of the details are slightly different.
BIOS, which stands for Basic Input/Output Services, is a small piece of software that is on a ROM or EPROM chip on your computer's system board. Among other things, it is the job of the BIOS to test hardware when the computer is first turned on, and to find and load the first part of the operating system off of the hard drive.
The POST
The first thing your computer does when you turn it on is run the POST, which stands for Power On Self Test. During this phase, your computer's BIOS basically checks out all its hardware and makes sure that everything is ...
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