US 11,797,367 B2
Displaying pre-boot error messages
Geroncio Ong Tan, Austin, TX (US); Yi Fan Wang, Taipei (TW); Hong-Ji Huang, Hsin-Chu (TW); Craig Lawrence Chaiken, Pflugerville, TX (US); and Timothy Carlyle Shaw, Austin, TX (US)
Assigned to Dell Products L.P., Round Rock, TX (US)
Filed by Dell Products L. P., Round Rock, TX (US)
Filed on Aug. 2, 2019, as Appl. No. 16/530,171.
Prior Publication US 2021/0034452 A1, Feb. 4, 2021
Int. Cl. G06F 11/00 (2006.01); G06F 11/07 (2006.01); G06F 13/28 (2006.01); G06F 9/4401 (2018.01); G06F 13/42 (2006.01); G06F 11/32 (2006.01)
CPC G06F 11/0769 (2013.01) [G06F 9/4403 (2013.01); G06F 11/0745 (2013.01); G06F 11/0751 (2013.01); G06F 11/327 (2013.01); G06F 13/28 (2013.01); G06F 13/4282 (2013.01); G06F 2213/0016 (2013.01)] 20 Claims
OG exemplary drawing
 
1. A method comprising:
determining, by an embedded controller of a computing device, that a power-on has been initiated;
determining, by the embedded controller, that a particular component of a plurality of components of the computing device has an issue that prevents a normal boot of a basic input output system (BIOS) of the computing device; and
only upon determining that the particular component has the issue, then:
sending a message from the embedded controller to a timing controller of a display panel, the message instructing the timing controller to access a data structure on a non-volatile storage and select one or more error or warning message data items_associated with the particular component or a system state from multiple different data items stored in the data structure,
in the timing controller, responding to the message from the embedded controller by:
accessing the non-volatile storage from the timing controller to select and retrieve the one or more error or warning message data items from the data structure,
assembling multiple separate data items into a composite bitmapped image, wherein the multiple separate data items include a logo and the one or more error or warning message data items retrieved from the data structure, and
displaying, on a display area of the display panel, the composite bitmapped image; and
only upon determining that the particular component does not have the issue, then in the timing controller:
accessing the non-volatile storage to select and retrieve one or more other data items from the data structure, and
displaying, on the display area of the display panel, a different image from the composite bitmapped image, the different image comprising the one or more other data items retrieved from the data structure and not comprising the one or more error or warning message data items;
wherein a display device connected to the computing device comprises the display panel and the timing controller.