BIOS and device drivers - difference?

[lunatic]

I am in a class atm and I need to find the difference between the two. Any help or replies would be appreciated.
Thanks in advance.

[haklesup]

BIOS (Basic Input Output System) is firmware and is located in an EPROM on the Motherboard. It is specific to the motherboard hardware and has basic code for booting the system hardware and hard disk drives etc. Real low level stuff and it is independent of the operating system (Windows or DOS). Look at the BIOS setup screen when rebooting to see what it can do.<p>Device drivers are loaded onto the HDD and used by specific hardware installed in the PC (scanners, camera, CDwriter) as well as some software in your HDD (database drivers). Device drivers allow the hardware to work within the operating system and would be different when the operating system shanges (different versions of Windows or mac for instance) many but not all device drivers have user interfaces sometimes in the control panel, sometimes in the program it serves.

[billdar]

hacklesup gave a very consise answer. I simplify everything so that my simple mind can grasp it.<p>The BIOS is the code that is loaded first and initializes the on board devices/chips. Things like memory size, clock speeds, interrupt numbers, and basic system info need to be setup before they will run.<p>Device drivers provide the operating system with the functions a device needs to operate. If it is a modem (UART) the driver provides an initialization function, an open port function, a send and so on.<p>Hope this doesn't detract from the earlier explanation.

[lunatic]

Thanks a lot guys, it was very appreciated.<p>=)