Releases

History of SeaBIOS releases. Please see Download for information on obtaining these releases.

SeaBIOS 1.6.3

Available on 20111004. Major changes in this release:

• Initial support for Xen
• PCI init (on emulators) uses a two-phase initialization
• Fixes for AHCI so it can work on real hardware. AHCI is now enabled by default.
• Bootsplash support for BMP files
• Several configuration options can now be configured at runtime via CBFS files

(eg, "etc/boot-menu-wait")

• PCI device scan is cached during POST phase
• Several bug fixes

SeaBIOS 0.6.2

Available on 20110228. Major changes in this release:

• Setup code can relocate to high-memory to save space in c-f segments
• Build now configured via Kconfig
• Experimental support for AHCI controllers
• Support for run-time configuration of the boot order (via CBFS/fw_cfg "bootorder" file)
• Support T13 EDD3.0 spec
• Improved bounds checking on PCI memory allocation
• Several bug fixes

SeaBIOS 0.6.1

Available on 20100913. Major changes in this release:

• Support for virtio drives
• Add ACPI definitions for cpu hotplug support
• Support for a graphical bootsplash screen
• USB mouse support
• The PCI support for emulators is less dependent on i440 chipset
• New malloc implementation which improves memalign and free
• The build system no longer double links objects
• Several bug fixes

SeaBIOS 0.6.0

Available on 20100326. Major changes in this release:

• USB hub support
• USB drive booting support
• USB keyboard auto-repeat support
• USB EHCI controller support
• Several improvements to compatibility of PS2 port handlers for old code
• Support for qemu e820 interface
• Several bug fixes and code cleanups

SeaBIOS 0.5.1

Available on 20100108. Major changes in this release:

• Support for 32bit PCI BIOS calls
• Support for int1589 calls
• MPTable fixes for OpenBSD
• ATA DMA and bus-mastering support
• Several bug fixes and code cleanups

SeaBIOS 0.5.0

Available on 20091218. Major changes in this release:

• Several enhancements ported from the Bochs BIOS derived code in qemu and kvm
• Support for parallel hardware initialization to reduce bootup times
• Enable PCI option rom support by default (Bochs users must now enable CONFIG_OPTIONROMS_DEPLOYED in src/config.h). Support added for extracting option roms from qemu "fw_cfg".
• Support USB UHCI and OHCI controllers
• Initial support for USB keyboards
• SeaBIOS can now be greater than 64K
• Support for permanent low memory allocations
• APIC "local interrupts" now enabled in SeaBIOS (on emulators)
• Several bug fixes and code cleanups

SeaBIOS 0.4.2

Available on 20090909. Major changes in this release:

• Implement Post Memory Manager (PMM) support. Use equivalent "malloc" functions for internal allocations as well.
• Refactor disk "block" interface for greater expandability
• Support CBFS based floppy images
• Allow boot menu to select either floppy to boot from
• Increase ebda size to store a CDROM harddrive/floppy emulation buffer
• Support systems with multiple vga cards (only the card with the legacy IO ranges mapped will have its option rom executed)
• Make option rom memory be writable during option rom execution (on emulators)
• Compile version number into code and report on each boot
• Several bug fixes and code cleanups

SeaBIOS 0.4.1

Available on 20090714. Major changes in this release:

• Support older versions of gcc that predate "-fwhole-program" (eg, v3.x)
• Add initial port of "LGPL vga bios" code into tree in "vgasrc/" directory
• Handle ATA drives still "spinning up" during SeaBIOS drive detect
• Add support for option rom Boot Connection Vectors (BCV)
• Enhance boot menu to support booting from any drive or any cdrom
• Support flash based Coreboot File System (CBFS)
• Support booting from a CBFS "payload"
• Support coreboot table forwarder
• Support compile time definitions for multiple root PCI buses
• New tools/readserial.py tool
• Several bug fixes and code cleanups

SeaBIOS 0.4.0

Available on 20090206. Major changes in this release:

• Add Bios Boot Specification (BBS) calls; add PnP call stubs
• Support option roms stored in PCI rom BAR
• Support rebooting on ctrl+alt+delete key press
• Scan PCI devices for ATA adapters (don't assume legacy ISA ATA ports are valid)
• Attempt to automatically determine gcc capabilities/bugs during build
• Add script to layout 16bit sections at fixed offsets and in compacted space
• Introduce timestamp counter based delays
• Support POST calls that are really a resume
• Use new stack in EBDA for int13 disk calls to reduce stack usage
• Support the EBDA being relocated by option roms
• Move many variables from EBDA to global variables (stored in f-segment)
• Support for PCI bridges when iterating through PCI device list
• Initial port of several KVM specific features from their Bochs BIOS derived code
• Access BDA using segment 0x40 and IVT using segment 0x00 (which could be important for 16bit protected mode callers)
• Several bug fixes and code cleanups

SeaBIOS 0.3.0

Available on 20080817. Major changes in this release:

• Run boot code (int18/19) in 32bit mode
• Rewrite of PS2 port handling - new code is more compatible with real hardware
• Initial support for int155f VGA option rom calls
• Several bug fixes and code cleanups

SeaBIOS 0.2.3

Available on 20080702. Major changes in this release:

• Initial support for running on real hardware with coreboot
• Support parsing coreboot tables
• Support relocating bios tables from high memory when running under coreboot
• Dynamic e820 map generation
• Serial debug support
• New tools/checkstack.py tool
• Several bug fixes and code cleanups

SeaBIOS 0.2.2

Formerly known as "legacybios". Available on 20080501. Major changes in this release:

• Several bug fixes and code cleanups

SeaBIOS 0.2.1

Formerly known as "legacybios". Available on 20080406. Major changes in this release:

• Port of boot menu code from Bochs BIOS
• Several bug fixes and code cleanups

SeaBIOS 0.2.0

Formerly known as "legacybios". Available on 20080330. Major changes in this release:

• Completion of initial port of Bochs BIOS code to gcc.