4 ms·

Serious question: The bios is a few megs large. Why not store sound clips and play them in case of an error?

staplung 3y ago
Like a voice saying "error 47"? A good question. If I had to guess I'd say probably either localization concerns or that it was just a continuation of a pattern that began well before BIOSs were large enough to store audio.
- kramerger 3y ago
  BIOS flash is a few megs larg., I think a few hundred kilobytes would be sufficient for either something generic (error 47, please consult user manual) or something more detailed (internal error, reset from back). Doesn't need to be 44.1K stereo and localised voice
  - mynameisvlad 3y ago
    > and localised voice Do you expect everyone to speak English? Localization would be critically important, and with a global supply chain, having one SKU for each language would cause you to get laughed out of a room if proposed.
  - justsomehnguy 3y ago
    > localised voice > 44.1K stereo Guess you never worked as L1 tech. Obligatory 'Reebok or Nike': https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uctpC2HnBfk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uctpC2HnBfk
bitwize 3y ago
You could even jam a Klatt synth in there and some text strings to say in a Stephen Hawking voice upon boot, e.g., "memory error".
syntheticnature 3y ago
I actually had a desktop motherboard, purchased about 2003-2004, that did this. Mind you, as it slowly succumbed to age (capacitor plague, most likely), it would start repeating "No CPU Installed, No CPU Installed..." as I watched it boot without issue. Once the sound driver was configured, it would stop.
- rzzzt 3y ago
  "ASUS POST Reporter" was one incarnation: http://web.archive.org/web/20081121022828/http://www.asus.com/999/html/events/mb/postreporter.htm http://web.archive.org/web/20081121022828/http://www.asus.co...
- AshamedCaptain 3y ago
  "System completed power on self test, computer now booting operating system" is forever burned into my mind.
kube-system 3y ago
Maybe modulation limitations? A square wave can often be output quite easily without the use of a DAC. Also the tiny piezo speakers frequently used on motherboards are often pretty bad at functioning as general purpose speakers. Something like voice might not be clearly audible through one of them. (And also, localization would be an issue.)
- justsomehnguy 3y ago
  The most amusing thing here is what those OTS speakers, being perfectly fine on the desktop mobos are... too large to be incorporated in any modern notebook.
jeroenhd 3y ago
You'd need sound drivers to operate the sound chip. The small PC speaker that's easy to access is also very bad at rendering speech. Playing some music seems like an excellent solution. With this reverse engineering done already, someone should be able to write a decoder app for looking up the error codes.
- Clamchop 3y ago
  Have laptops had a separate pc speaker in recent memory?
  - jeroenhd 3y ago
    No, but they seem to have some kind of compatibility wrapper to emulate the PC speaker in firmware. The early boot process on my laptop has plenty of beeps and boops I can enable but nothing more advanced than that until the operating system loads a real driver. If the UEFI firmware could play sound files, the laptop would come with much friendlier sounding (less shrill) noises.
    - Dylan16807 3y ago
      A barebones single-channel sound driver shouldn't be complicated. It should also be simpler than "some kind of compatibility wrapper to emulate the PC speaker in firmware".
    - kalleboo 3y ago
      It's not a technical limitation, PC manufacturers just don't care about doing anything above the bare minimum to ship a cheap box. Sony used to put in the effort in their VAIO machines like 24 years ago and gave them high quality boot sounds https://youtu.be/wPVIubVtdRY?t=907 https://youtu.be/wPVIubVtdRY?t=907
      - WWLink 3y ago
        The Vaio chime was my favorite
Thoreandan 3y ago
Apple PowerPC Macs definitely did this - the car crash would play if POST failed. YT collection of Mac chimes (~48s): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zkBcpXL94rA&t=48s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zkBcpXL94rA&t=48s

Like a voice saying "error 47"? A good question. If I had to guess I'd say probably either localization concerns or that it was just a continuation of a pattern that began well before BIOSs were large enough to store audio.

kramerger 3y ago
BIOS flash is a few megs larg., I think a few hundred kilobytes would be sufficient for either something generic (error 47, please consult user manual) or something more detailed (internal error, reset from back). Doesn't need to be 44.1K stereo and localised voice
- mynameisvlad 3y ago
  > and localised voice Do you expect everyone to speak English? Localization would be critically important, and with a global supply chain, having one SKU for each language would cause you to get laughed out of a room if proposed.
- justsomehnguy 3y ago
  > localised voice > 44.1K stereo Guess you never worked as L1 tech. Obligatory 'Reebok or Nike': https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uctpC2HnBfk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uctpC2HnBfk

bitwize 3y ago

You could even jam a Klatt synth in there and some text strings to say in a Stephen Hawking voice upon boot, e.g., "memory error".

syntheticnature 3y ago

I actually had a desktop motherboard, purchased about 2003-2004, that did this. Mind you, as it slowly succumbed to age (capacitor plague, most likely), it would start repeating "No CPU Installed, No CPU Installed..." as I watched it boot without issue. Once the sound driver was configured, it would stop.

rzzzt 3y ago
"ASUS POST Reporter" was one incarnation: http://web.archive.org/web/20081121022828/http://www.asus.com/999/html/events/mb/postreporter.htm http://web.archive.org/web/20081121022828/http://www.asus.co...
AshamedCaptain 3y ago
"System completed power on self test, computer now booting operating system" is forever burned into my mind.

kube-system 3y ago

Maybe modulation limitations? A square wave can often be output quite easily without the use of a DAC. Also the tiny piezo speakers frequently used on motherboards are often pretty bad at functioning as general purpose speakers. Something like voice might not be clearly audible through one of them. (And also, localization would be an issue.)

justsomehnguy 3y ago
The most amusing thing here is what those OTS speakers, being perfectly fine on the desktop mobos are... too large to be incorporated in any modern notebook.

jeroenhd 3y ago

You'd need sound drivers to operate the sound chip. The small PC speaker that's easy to access is also very bad at rendering speech. Playing some music seems like an excellent solution. With this reverse engineering done already, someone should be able to write a decoder app for looking up the error codes.

Clamchop 3y ago
Have laptops had a separate pc speaker in recent memory?
- jeroenhd 3y ago
  No, but they seem to have some kind of compatibility wrapper to emulate the PC speaker in firmware. The early boot process on my laptop has plenty of beeps and boops I can enable but nothing more advanced than that until the operating system loads a real driver. If the UEFI firmware could play sound files, the laptop would come with much friendlier sounding (less shrill) noises.
  - Dylan16807 3y ago
    A barebones single-channel sound driver shouldn't be complicated. It should also be simpler than "some kind of compatibility wrapper to emulate the PC speaker in firmware".
  - kalleboo 3y ago
    It's not a technical limitation, PC manufacturers just don't care about doing anything above the bare minimum to ship a cheap box. Sony used to put in the effort in their VAIO machines like 24 years ago and gave them high quality boot sounds https://youtu.be/wPVIubVtdRY?t=907 https://youtu.be/wPVIubVtdRY?t=907
    - WWLink 3y ago
      The Vaio chime was my favorite

Thoreandan 3y ago

Apple PowerPC Macs definitely did this - the car crash would play if POST failed. YT collection of Mac chimes (~48s): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zkBcpXL94rA&t=48s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zkBcpXL94rA&t=48s