According to the list of features in Vista SP1 here, it now supports UEFI! In particular, it notes the ability to boot from UEFI, the ability to network boot from UEFI and the ability to manipulate GPT (Guided Partition Table) partitions with the various partition tools. Here are the particular snippest of interest:
- Adds support for new UEFI (Unified Extensible Firmware Interface) industry standard PC firmware for 64-bit systems with functional parity with legacy BIOS firmware, which allows Windows Vista SP1 to install to GPT format disks, boot and resume from hibernate using UEFI firmware.
- Adds support for x64 EFI network boot.
- Adds support for creating a single DVD media that boots on PCs with either BIOS or EFI.
Just to keep this in perspective, this, along with the proposed Longhorn Server 2008 UEFI support and the GRUB support for UEFI, starts the gradual transition process.
Up until now, there have been a few other forces moving things towards UEFI. For example, silicon vendors only providing silicon support in the form of Framework or UEFI Platform Initialization drivers. These drivers essentially require the UEFI environment except for the boot loader. Also, with 2TB+ drives on the horizon, the GPT support will be needed, since the Master Boot Record (MBR) used by current OS loaders tops out at 2TB and no one seems inclined to try and patch it.
But now with widespread OS support for UEFI, the real transition begins. It still takes a while, since many manufacturing lines and support tools still depend on the MBR.
Tim
