Giving Linux the BootLet s face it: As enjoyable (Web hosting asp)
Giving Linux the BootLet s face it: As enjoyable as the experience of staring at a dormant computeris, the real fun starts when you turn on the computer. As with any electronicdevice, opening the electron floodgate is the first step to fun. A computer, however, has much more stuff to do than your toaster oven. Rather than actas a simple heating element, your computer has to check all those gizmosthat you (or the manufacturer) plugged into your computer s motherboard. After the initial power-up, the computer performs some simple hardwaretests (called the POST, or Power-Up Self Test) to determine whether thosevarious components are working properly. Checking all your hardware is just the beginning. Between the time you turnthe computer on and the moment the glowing phosphor on your monitorprompts you for a login name, the computer is building itself an empire. Ifyou listen and watch carefully, your computer and monitor show signs of theboot process through bleeps, buzzes, whirring motors, clicks, messages onthe monitor, and blinking lights. Although you have heard the clich Rome wasn t built in a day, the bootprocess goes fairly quickly. This is pretty amazing, considering that the archi- tecture of an operating system makes Rome s look like a stack of cardboardboxes and that each time you power up your computer, it must build itswhole operating system in memory. (Remember that an operating systemisthe core software that makes your computer work.) This process can bebroken into four main steps, which I discuss in the following sections. Step 1: Power-On Self-Test (POST) leads to BIOSThe POST process really has nothing to do with the operating system. Yourcomputer performs this step whether you re running Linux or another oper- ating system such as Windows XP. Some symptoms of a failed POST include An unusual series of long and short beeps. Nothing displayed on the monitor. No apparent activity other than the whirring fan on the power supply. A puff of smoke or the pungent smell of burning electrical componentsfrom your computer case. An error message, displayed on the monitor, indicating a hardware failure. If you encounter any of these problems, you have hardware troubles thatneed to be resolved before you can proceed. Chances are, if your computer96Part I:Getting Your Feet Wet
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