How To Get BIOS, FIRMWARE And Installed Drivers Details

How to get the BIOS (Basic Input Output System) information and other information such as
1.Hardware
2.CPU information
3.Drivers installed in Linux machine.

For every operation/work in Linux there will be one command, this is true.(all you need to find out that command is use. Google to get it). So how to get BIOS info without rebooting the system. The command for this is dmidecode(DMI table decoder). Some times BIOS is called as DMI too. Just execute the command, It will just dump lots and lots of information about the sytem.

#dmidecode

To get more presised/cliped information for particular category such as only BIOS or only hardware or only RAM details or just only CPU info we have to specify the type(--tyep or -t option), here are the types list for your reference.

DMI TYPES
The SMBIOS specification defines the following DMI types:

Type Information
----------------------------------------
0 BIOS
1 System
2 Base Board
3 Chassis

4 Processor
5 Memory Controller
6 Memory Module
7 Cache
8 Port Connector

9 System Slots
10 On Board Devices
11 OEM Strings
12 System Configuration Options
13 BIOS Language
14 Group Associations
15 System Event Log
16 Physical Memory Array
17 Memory Device
18 32-bit Memory Error
19 Memory Array Mapped Address
20 Memory Device Mapped Address
21 Built-in Pointing Device
22 Portable Battery
23 System Reset
24 Hardware Security
25 System Power Controls
26 Voltage Probe
27 Cooling Device
28 Temperature Probe
29 Electrical Current Probe
30 Out-of-band Remote Access
31 Boot Integrity Services
32 System Boot
33 64-bit Memory Error
34 Management Device
35 Management Device Component

36 Management Device Threshold Data
37 Memory Channel
38 IPMI Device
39 Power Supply

Here is some examples.
Note : In RHEL4 there are no options for dmidecode command.

To find only BIOS info

#dmidecode –t 0
[root@test ~]# dmidecode --type 0
# dmidecode 2.7
SMBIOS 2.5 present.

Handle 0x0000, DMI type 0, 24 bytes.
BIOS Information
Vendor : Phoenix Technologies, LTD
Version : MS7352 1.14
Release Date : 09/03/2008
Address : 0xE0000
Runtime Size : 128 kB
ROM Size : 1024 kB
Characteristics:
ISA is supported
PCI is supported
PNP is supported
APM is supported
BIOS is upgradeable
BIOS shadowing is allowed
Boot from CD is supported
Selectable boot is supported
BIOS ROM is socketed
EDD is supported
5.25"/360 KB floppy services are supported (int 13h)
5.25"/1.2 MB floppy services are supported (int 13h)
3.5"/720 KB floppy services are supported (int 13h)
3.5"/2.88 MB floppy services are supported (int 13h)
Print screen service is supported (int 5h)
8042 keyboard services are supported (int 9h)
Serial services are supported (int 14h)
Printer services are supported (int 17h)
CGA/mono video services are supported (int 10h)
ACPI is supported
USB legacy is supported
LS-120 boot is supported
ATAPI Zip drive boot is supported
BIOS boot specification is supported
Function key-initiated network boot is supported
Targeted content distribution is supported
BIOS Revision: 1.14
Even we can specify keyword for specifying type if you forget the type number, so just type the keyword to check particular property of the styem.

Keyword Types
------------------------------
bios 0, 13
system 1, 12, 15, 23, 32
baseboard 2, 10
chassis 3
processor 4
memory 5, 6, 16, 17
cache 7
connector 8
slot 9

Suppose we want to see system details

[root@test ~]# dmidecode --type system
# dmidecode 2.7
SMBIOS 2.5 present.

Handle 0x0001, DMI type 1, 27 bytes.
System Information :
Manufacturer : Hewlett-Packard
Product Name : HP Compaq dx7400 Microtower
Version:
Serial Number: SGH83801NJ
UUID: 809AF9C0-17F0-1310-9511-C4681D1F835D
Wake-up Type: Power Switch
SKU Number: GD384AV
Family: 103C_53307F

Handle 0x0024, DMI type 32, 11 bytes.
System Boot Information
Status: No errors detected

[root@test ~]#

Some other useful commands to get system info are

To get CPU info
#cat /etc/cpuinfo

To get HW info
#lshal

or
#lshw

To get PCI info
#lspci

To get USB info
#lsusb

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