So there's been a bunch of questions about 32-bit OSes on the MinnowBoard MAX, and a fair amount of confusion on what's going on there. I've updated the wiki documentation
http://www.elinux.org/Minnowboard:MaxBios#32-bit_vs._64-bit_UEFI but figured a quick discussion here would be helpful. When UEFI was designed they made a conscious and explicit design decision: Firmware's number of bits should match the OSes number of bits. Meaning if firmware is 32-bit, the OS has to be 32-bit. If firmware is 64-bit, the OS has to be 64-bit. There's a variety of reasons why this decision was made, but it was made. What this means to MinnowBoard MAX users: The short version is if you want to run a 64-bit OS, this entire e-mail is a no-op. If you want to run a 32-bit OS, you have to jump through some hoops. If you *REALLY* want to run a 32-bit OS there's some steps you'll need to follow, and I've outlined them at http://www.elinux.org/Minnowboard:MaxBios#Switching_from_64-bit_to_32-bit Basically you have to re-flash the firmware with a 32-bit firmware. There's a line in the instructions that may confuse some folks, specifically using a FirmwareUpdateX64.efi to flash a 32-bit firmware. This is because when you go to change the firmware you are running a 64-bit firmware, and therefore need a 64-bit EFI program to actually do the flashing. If you want to switch back, you'll do the opposite, use FirmwareUpdateIA32.efi to flash a 64-bit firmware. If I've missed something, let me know, I'd rather cover everything we can in our documentation. - John 'Warthog9' Hawley _______________________________________________ elinux-MinnowBoard mailing list [email protected] http://lists.elinux.org/mailman/listinfo/elinux-minnowboard
