System and method to install firmware volumes from NVMe boot partition

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10990411-B2
Application number	US-201916363978-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Mar 25, 2019
Priority date	Mar 25, 2019
Publication date	Apr 27, 2021
Grant date	Apr 27, 2021

Abstract

An information handling system includes a BIOS ROM that stores a first firmware volume of BIOS code. A non-volatile memory device includes a first boot partition that stores a second firmware volume of the BIOS code. A processor executes the first and second firmware volumes during a Pre-EFI Initialization phase of a Unified Extensible Firmware Interface boot process.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. An information handling system, comprising:
a processor;
a Basic Input/Output System (BIOS) read-only memory (ROM) device to store a first firmware volume of BIOS code for the information handling system; and
a non-volatile memory device including a first boot partition to store a second firmware volume of the BIOS code, and a copy of the first firmware volume, wherein the processor executes the first and second firmware volumes during Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI) boot process.

2. The information handling system of claim 1 , wherein a sum of a size of the first firmware volume and a size of the second firmware volume is greater than a capacity of the BIOS ROM device.

3. The information handling system of claim 1 , wherein in executing the second firmware volume during the UEFI boot process, the processor executes the second firmware volume from the first boot partition.

4. The information handling system of claim 1 , wherein the non-volatile memory device includes a second boot partition.

5. The information handling system of claim 4 , wherein the second boot partition stores a copy of the first firmware volume.

6. The information handling system of claim 5 , wherein the processor further:
stores a third firmware volume to the second boot partition;
reboots the information handling system; and
executes the copy of the first firmware volume and the third firmware volume during the UEFI reboot process.

7. The information handling system of claim 6 , wherein the processor executes the copy of the first firmware volume and the third firmware volume from the second boot partition.

8. The information handling system of claim 6 , wherein the third firmware volume is a modified version of the second firmware volume.

9. The information handling system of claim 1 , wherein the non-volatile memory device is a Non-Volatile Memory-Express device.

10. A method, comprising:
storing a first firmware volume in a Basic Input/Output System (BIOS) read-only memory (ROM) device of an information handling system;
storing a copy of the first firmware volume and a second firmware volume in a first boot partition of a non-volatile memory device of the information handling system; and
executing, by the information handling system, the first and second firmware volumes during a Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI) boot process.

11. The method of claim 10 , wherein a sum of a size of the first firmware volume and a size of the second firmware volume is greater than a capacity of the BIOS ROM device.

12. The method of claim 10 , wherein in executing the second firmware volume during the boot process, the method further comprises:
executing, by the processor, the second firmware volume from the first boot partition.

13. The method of claim 10 , wherein the non-volatile memory device includes a second boot partition.

14. The method of claim 13 , further comprising:
storing a copy of the first firmware volume to the second boot.

15. The method of claim 14 , further comprising:
storing a third firmware volume to the second boot partition;
rebooting the information handling system; and
executing, by the processor, the copy of the first firmware volume and the third firmware volume during the PEI phase of the UEFI reboot process.

16. The method of claim 15 , wherein in executing the copy of the first firmware volume and the third firmware volume, the method further comprises:
executing, by the processor, the copy of the first firmware volume and the third firmware volume from the second boot partition.

17. The method of claim 15 , wherein the third firmware volume is a modified version of the second firmware volume.

18. The method of claim 10 , wherein the non-volatile memory device is a Non-Volatile Memory-Express device.

Assignees

• Dell Products Lp

Inventors

• Zhu Xiaomei
• Chiu Mick
• Chuang Franklin
• Montero Adolfo S
• Hsu Isaac

Classifications

• G06F9/4401 Primary

  Bootstrapping (security arrangements therefor G06F21/57) · CPC title

• G06F8/63 Primary

  Image based installation; Cloning; Build to order · CPC title