<!—#set var="article_header" value="Under Closer Scrutiny:
Dual BIOS From Gigabyte» —>
Gigabyte’s Dual BIOS Tradition
Flash tool in an AMI BIOS
Every mainboard can be destroyed through improper flashing of the BIOS, or through manual modifications of the flash file. In such a situation, the either the BIOS cannot be loaded without errors, or invalid settings are assigned to the components. For this reason, some manufacturers, such as Gigabyte, offer a dual BIOS function with many of their mainboards.
Dual BIOS In Detail
This is how Dual BIOS works with Gigabyte.
If the first «normal» flash BIOS is damaged, then a function built into the Gigabyte board checks to see if the BIOS starts correctly or not. If BIOS does not start correctly, then the motherboard automatically switches over to the backup BIOS. This gives you the possibility of overwriting the damaged flash BIOS and initiating a new startup process.
Modification Of A Flash BIOS
Tools for modifying the Bios.
Logos to replace the Energy Star symbol.
- http://juggernaut.de/index.html
- http://www.miro.pair.com/tweakbios/
- http://www.xterna-net.de/~magichand/bios.htm
There are a variety of tools available in the Internet that make it possible to replace annoying images (for example, the Energy logo) with your own logo. Some manufacturers have their own company logos appear during startup — with the help of the appropriate tools, you can replace these manually as well.
With dual BIOS, replacing these images is now free of risk, giving the tech enthusiast more leeway to experiment
Conclusion: Less Burden and Costs for Support
In our last comparison, the fact that dual BIOS gives users more room to flash and modify BIOS was downplayed. When an error occurs while flashing, dual BIOS gives users the chance to restore the original BIOS without a lot of hassle. For standard mainboards without dual BIOS, if an error occurs during a flash procedure, then the only option is to send it back to the manufacturer.
