The Booting Process

Booting (also known as booting up) is the initial set of operations that a computer system performs when electrical power is switched on. The process begins when a computer that has been turned off is re-energized, and ends when the computer is ready to perform its normal operations. On modern general purpose computers, this can take tens of seconds and typically involves performing power-on self-test, locating and initializing peripheral devices, and then finding, loading and starting an operating system. Many computer systems also allow these operations to be initiated by a software command without cycling power, in what is known as a soft reboot, though some of the initial operations might be skipped on a soft reboot. A boot loader is a computer program that loads the main operating system or runtime environment for the computer after completion of self-tests.

The computer term boot is short for bootstrap or bootstrap load and derives from the phrase to pull oneself up by one's bootstraps. The usage calls attention to the paradox that a computer cannot run without first loading software but some software must run before any software can be loaded. Early computers used a variety of ad-hoc methods to get a fragment of software into memory to solve this problem. The invention of integrated circuit Read-only memory (ROM) of various types solved the paradox by allowing computers to be shipped with a start up program that could not be erased, but growth in the size of ROM has allowed ever more elaborate start up procedures to be implemented.

There are numerous examples of single and multi-stage boot sequences that begin with the execution of boot program(s) stored in boot ROMs. During the booting process, the binary code of an operating system or runtime environment may be loaded from nonvolatile secondary storage (such as a hard disk drive) into volatile, or random-access memory (RAM) and then executed. Some simpler embedded systems do not require a noticeable boot sequence to begin functioning and may simply run operational programs stored in read-only memory (ROM) when turned on.

The order of booting -

In order for a computer to successfully boot, its BIOS, operating system and hardware components must all be working properly; failure of any one of these three elements will likely result in a failed boot sequence.

When the computer's power is first turned on, the CPU initializes itself, which is triggered by a series of clock ticks generated by the system clock. Part of the CPU's initialization is to look to the system's ROM BIOS for its first instruction in the startup program. The ROM BIOS stores the first instruction, which is the instruction to run the power-on self test (POST), in a predetermined memory address. POST begins by checking the BIOS chip and then tests CMOS RAM. If the POST does not detect a battery failure, it then continues to initialize the CPU, checking the inventoried hardware devices (such as the video card), secondary storage devices, such as hard drives and floppy drives, ports and other hardware devices, such as the keyboard and mouse, to ensure they are functioning properly.

Once the POST has determined that all components are functioning properly and the CPU has successfully initialized, the BIOS looks for an OS to load.

The BIOS typically looks to the CMOS chip to tell it where to find the OS, and in most PCs, the OS loads from the C drive on the hard drive even though the BIOS has the capability to load the OS from a floppy disk, CD or ZIP drive. The order of drives that the CMOS looks to in order to locate the OS is called the boot sequence, which can be changed by altering the CMOS setup. Looking to the appropriate boot drive, the BIOS will first encounter the boot record, which tells it where to find the beginning of the OS and the subsequent program file that will initialize the OS.

Once the OS initializes, the BIOS copies its files into memory and the OS basically takes over control of the boot process. Now in control, the OS performs another inventory of the system's memory and memory availability (which the BIOS already checked) and loads the device drivers that it needs to control the peripheral devices, such as a printer, scanner, optical drive, mouse and keyboard. This is the final stage in the boot process, after which the user can access the system’s applications to perform tasks.