Hi,

When I update a bios in a mainboard, sometimes I get the option to update the dmi as well.

What the heck is dmi? I understand it can hold more info for the os to get or is the just smbios?

I originally thought that it was part of a verification tool that can with boxes bundled with M$ Windows, but have read that it has effects on linux as well.

Whenever I use a monitoring tool to see all my hardware eg. Everest. It says dmi info cannot be verified, or something of that nature.

I have updated the bios in a toshiba laptop that had a recovery disc that work not work till you modified the dmi back to the original setting. This was done by an utility on the restore disc called chgdmi.exe. One had to retype in the name and model of the laptop to reset it after executing the app.

I have read the section in wikipedia and still am confused. In older mainboards the bios was kind of two parts. The writable and the part you had to change a jumper to write to. Is this the same idea?

Also on the cicero (which essentially has a gigabyte board and some other hardware) I first used a bios from intel (which was wrong but still managed to flash and work,(this was one of my first bios updates). Then I used one from the circero site which also worked, but not until recently I thought that maybe be an update from the motherboard manufacturer might be the best option and yes it was. Now I can see my sata load on the post screen.

So I was given an option in the last senario (gigabyte update) to update the dmi. So I believe I selected yes.

How do I tell if it was successful? What kind of negative impact can it have if it were wrong/corrupt?

Any help would be great, thanks

The DMI is "Destktop Management Information". The SMBOIS provides information to the DMI (and other places). The DMI has a database of installed components. So if you go from BIOS x to BIOS y, or increase RAM memory, or increase the size of the Hard drive DMI wants to know.

Part of the Linux checks DMI.

My advice is "If it ain't broke, don't fix it." It the machine works and doesn't hang doing a DMI check, fine! It is working. Leave it.

Ok but I have done something to it. How do I know it was right? How do I check?

Try dmidecode

Ok so DMI is generated automatically? Why would I need to update it then? There have been various bioses that have asked me that. Wouldn't it update on its own? My gigabyte baord asked if I would like to update and I selected yes.

So when I update is it like editing xorg or something? Like a text file? If I ran an updater how would I know it updated? I checked dmidecode, pretty straight forward.

Does DMI affect system performance or is it only a informational tool?

This is getting beyond the limits of my knowledge now.

DMI was created back in the days of Windows 95/ Windows 98 - before plug-and-play. If it suspects that a change has occurred it will ask if it should be updated, but in a way it is asking for confirmation that a change has occurred. Does that make sense?

In a way it affects system behaviour AND it is an information tool. The computer checks that it has components a, b, c, and so on. If it suddenly finds that component "f" isn't there and strange component "27" is there it might have problems.

Have a look at 1) http://www.computerhope.com/issues/ch000474.htm "Computer stops at verifying dmi pool data"
and 2) http://trends.newsforge.com/article....&tid=91&tid=29
"Dmidecode: What is it good for?"