Designs for Multi-OS Boot Loaders
You've probably realized by now that there's considerable variety in boot loaders, and that their capabilities vary substantially and interact with the OSs being booted. In this section I describe the basic types of boot loaders, including their strengths and weaknesses. Most boot loaders fall into one of these categories, though some might contain aspects of two or more, and a few can actually be used in any of several categories, depending on how the product is configured.
Floppy-Based Boot Loaders
Figure 4.1 depicts the boot process proceeding from the BIOS to the MBR on a hard disk. Depending on a computer's configuration, though, the boot process can proceed from the BIOS to a floppy disk or to some other ...
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