Hack 6 Configure Boot Device Order 
Don't wait for the floppy disk
or CD-ROM to time out before the system boots.
One advantage of modern
BIOS and hardware capabilities is that
they allow you to boot up from something other than a diskette or
hard drive. BIOS can now fetch and run an operating system from an
appropriately capable and configured LAN adapter or a bootable
CD-ROM. You can tell the BIOS which devices it should try to boot up
from, and in what order.
For a faster boot time you probably want your hard drive to be the
first device in the list, as shown in Figure 1-8,
ignoring the presence of diskettes or bootable CD-ROMs, although some
BIOSes will detect the presence of a bootable CD-ROM and offer the
option of booting off the CD regardless of the boot device order you
set. Skipping the process of looking for a bootable diskette or
CD-ROM by telling the BIOS to boot from the IDE hard drive first can shave anywhere
from a few seconds to tens of seconds off your boot time.
If you do choose to put the hard drive first in the boot order, you
will not be able to boot up from a diskette or CD-ROM. You can come
back to this parameter to change the boot device order to boot from a
device other than the hard drive, as shown in Figure 1-9, when you need to run a diagnostic program,
load a new image onto the hard drive using a program like
Symantec's GHOST, or reinstall the operating system.
If you want to boot from a drive connected to a USB port, you must
have a BIOS that supports booting from USB ZIP, USB FDD, USB HDD, or
alternate devices as one of the boot options.
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