What can Firmwareupgrade do?

[yuppi]

I somewhere read that you can save your firmware, so i conclude that you can update your firmware. But what can be changed by firmwareupdate?

[Kosh Naranek]

Firmware is programming that is inserted into programmable read-only memory (programmable ROM), thus becoming a permanent part of a computing device.
Firmware is created and tested like software (using microcode simulation). When ready, it can be distributed like other software and, using a special user interface, installed in the programmable read-only memory by the user. Firmware is sometimes distributed for printers, modems, CD-RW drives, DVD-Drives and other computer devices.

IBM prefers the term microcode.

In other words .. you can upgrade the firmware with a newer revision correcting errors etc. , but you can't make a device do things it's hardware can't do.

[Wombat]

In my world, microcode and firmware are very different things.

[Marshmallowman]

yeah. microcode is the internal instructions in processors.

eg a CISC processors breaks it complex instructioins into microcode. Micrcode in CPU's can be updated..

firmware is the operational code embedded into a device, code that remains when the device is powered down(non-volatile, but may be updated), as opposed to software which must be loaded when the device is powered up.(volatile)

And hardware is well...hardware it don't change and can not be updated(kind of)

[xortam]

You know, yuppi is probably only wondering about how this would affect his G400 or something.

The G series firmware upgrades are minor bug fixes generally. Unfortunately we don't always get documentation on what those fixes are. The firmware can also be set to enable "TV output support for DOS".

[yuppi]

What i really was wondering about is the fact that the edge-detection is imho done in hardware. When Parhelia doesn't detect all edges correctly how might this be corrected if it is in full hardware. This lead to the point where I was asking about. How can the edge-detection be improved with firmware-updates, or is there a need for a revison to get all edges FAA.