Computers to boot up in seconds

A big and welcome change could be coming to PCs. The time spent waiting for our computer to boot up could soon be cut to seconds instead of the minute or three we currently have to wait. This is good news for people who pull their hair out at the length of time it takes for a PC to start. How will this happen? There will be an update to one of the most basic pieces of start-up software – the Bios. This does all the groundwork and prepares the Operating System. It is an old piece of technology that has never caught up with the power and speed of today’s computers. Its replacement, the Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI), should be on most PCs by 2011. The UEFI is more flexible and much faster than the Bios. Mark Doran, head of the group overseeing the development of the UEFI, explained the benefits to the BBC: "At the moment it can be 25-30 seconds of boot time before you see the first bit of OS sign-on. With UEFI we're getting it under a handful of seconds," he said. Mr Doran said that the technology is developing very quickly, saying: "In terms of boot speed, we're not at ‘instant-on’ yet but it is already a lot better than the conventional Bios can manage and we're getting closer to that every day." The UEFI is expected to save companies around the world billions of dollars. When time is money, having to wait minutes to start work after turning a PC on costs industry a fortune. Home users will also say goodbye to tapping their fingers on their desk.