What is BIOS?

 A BIOS (Basic Input/Output System) is an electronic set of instructions that a computer uses to successfully start operating. The BIOS is located on a chip inside of the computer and is designed in a way that protects it from disk failure.

A main function of the BIOS is to give instructions for the power-on self test (POST). This self test ensures that the computer has all of the necessary parts and functionality needed to successfully start itself, such as use of memory, a keyboard and other parts. If errors are detected during the test, the BIOS instructs the computer to give a code that reveals the problem. Error codes are typically a series of beeps heard shortly after startup.

What is an Operating System?

An Operating System(OS) is a program designed to run other programs on a computer. A computer’s operating system is its most important program. It is considered the backbone of a computer, managing both software and hardware resources. Operating systems are responsible for everything from the control and allocation of memory to recognizing input from external devices and transmitting output to computer displays. They also manage files on computer hard drives and control peripherals, like printers and scanners.

The operating system of a large computer system has even more work to do. Such operating systems monitor different programs and users, making sure everything runs smoothly, without interference, despite the fact that numerous devices and programs are used simultaneously. An operating system also has a vital role to play in security. Its job includes preventing unauthorized users from accessing the computer system.

Rovio Mobile's Vesterbacka on how Angry Birds became successful

Talk about killing two birds with one stone. Particularly if it's from Peter Vesterbacka , the CMO or the Mighty Eagle of Rovio Mobile, the Finnish company behind the Angry Birds phenomenon. At Cannes, apart from speaking at the annual ad fest, Vesterbacka was also scouting and hunting for talent .

The success rate - two short-list for the top position at Rovio. Even as he moves to the next level of talent hunt, Verterbacka takes pot-shots , aiming directly at the brands. Brands, he says, are wasting their time advertising on television. "With our reach we can provide a much better bang-for-the buck to them" . While, one can debate the claims made by the Mighty Eagle, the fact remains Angry Birds has caught the attention of millions across the world. In a chat with BE, Vesterbacka talks about the origin of Angry Birds and the flight towards becoming an entertainment company in the time to come.

How did Rovio Mobile and Angry Birds happen?

After winning a game development competition sponsored by Nokia and HP, Niklas Hed founded a mobile game development studio in 2004 in Finland. We had developed 51 titles, before Rovio hit gold with Angry Birds. The Angry Bird app took off in small countries first - Finland, Sweden, Denmark, Greece, and the Czech Republic - before being featured on the front page of the UK App Store in February of 2010, where it jumped from 600th to first. Since then, the growth has been explosive - the app is number one in 79 countries, with 250 million downloads, 4 million Facebook fans, and tens of millions of views on Facebook!

What was the origin of the Birds, who have shaken the world with their anger?


Our game designer Jaakko Lisalo created a concept featuring a flock of manic birds, and something about their furious expressions was immediately appealing to the rest of the Rovio team. The game-play hadn't even been developed yet, but there was a feeling in the air that these birds had something special. Many of the now iconic elements associated with Angry Birds weren't even present in the initial screen-shot and were only implemented during the development process.

To what do you attribute the success of the Angry Birds phenomenon across the globe that seems to be popular across the ages?

From the beginning, we were focused on creating a worldwide phenomenon. (We felt) There's something inherently appealing about these birds - maybe it's their crazed expressions , bright colors and broadly drawn features, or their hero's quest to rescue their eggs. Like many iconic characters, the flightless Angry Birds may appear small and vulnerable, but they are actually very powerful. Think pudgy Mario the plumber versus the monstrous Bowser , or Bugs Bunny versus the hunter Elmer Fudd. That's a narrative that's very appealing to all ages.

With a following, comprising of 50 million downloads and 1.2 billion hours a year consumption, what are the plans for the Birds to take them to the next level?

We have an amazing fan base. In addition to our four million fans on Facebook and our millions of views on YouTube, we get tons of pictures from fans of their homemade art, crafts, cakes, videos, musical tributes, live-action games, and clothing, as well as mountains of tweets expressing their interest and support. This shows that people are really excited about these characters and want to engage with them more. We're going to keep existing fans engaged while pushing into new platforms and forms of media in order to reach as many fans as possible.
We recently acquired the Finnish animation studio Kombo, and just recently we had a very exciting media announcement. David Maisel, the former chairman of Marvel Studios, will be acting as a special advisor to Rovio in order to help us develop our film and media strategy and will also serve as executive producer of future Angry Birds films. We're ramping up our book publishing operation, and we have a cookbook of egg recipes already on the way.

As we transition into being an entertainment company, we're going to keep releasing great new games, but we're also going to offer many new ways of interacting with these beloved characters. Without getting into the specific details of our long-term plan, we can say that "world domination" is a good start!

How is your fan base in India? Anything specifically lined up for the Indian market?

We have a significant and growing fan base in India, and we are hoping for even more intense growth as adoption of smart phones in India increases. To thank our fans in India for their support, we're even looking into the possibility of giving them a special treat!

Convert FAT to NTFS or NTFS to FAT

To convert a FAT partition to NTFS, perform the following steps.

Click Start, click Programs, and then click Command Prompt. In Windows XP, click Start, click Run, type cmd and then click OK.
At the command prompt, type CONVERT [driveletter]: /FS:NTFS. Convert.exe will attempt to convert the partition to NTFS.

NOTE:
Although the chance of corruption or data loss during the conversion from FAT to NTFS is minimal, it is best to perform a full backup of the data on the drive that it is to be converted prior to executing the convert command.