Image forming apparatus and control method thereof
AssigneeCanon Kabushiki Kaisha
InventorTakaaki Miyata
Life of this patent
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Abstract
An image forming apparatus comprises a non-volatile memory storing start-up firmware a volatile memory having a memory space commonly available for the start-up firmware and an operating system of the image forming apparatus; and a control unit configured to copy, to the memory space, a setting value of a setting item for write-protecting the non-volatile memory, among setting items included in the start-up firmware, wherein the operating system acquires and checks the setting value copied to the memory space.
Claims9
An image forming apparatus comprising:
- a non-volatile memory storing start-up firmware
- a volatile memory having a memory space commonly available for the start-up firmware and an operating system of the image forming apparatus;
- a PCI-Express controlling an access to the non-volatile memory;
- and
- a control unit configured to:
- activate the start-up firmware;
- in accordance with control of the start-up firmware, copy, from the non-volatile memory to a portion of the memory space provided in a predetermined region of the volatile memory, a setting value of a setting item for write-protecting based on an address in the PCI-Express for accessing to a setting item that prohibits writing into the start-up firmware;
- activate the operating system;
- and
- in accordance with control of the operating system, acquire the setting value copied to the portion of the memory space provided in the predetermined region of the volatile memory after activating the operating system, without executing a setup menu of the start-up firmware.
A control method of an image forming apparatus including a non-volatile memory storing start-up firmware, a volatile memory having a memory space commonly available for the start-up firmware and an operating system of the image forming apparatus, and a PCI-Express controlling an access to the non-volatile memory, the control method comprising:
- activating the start-up firmware;
- in accordance with control of the start-up firmware, copying, from the non-volatile memory to a portion of the memory space provided in a predetermined region of the volatile memory and before starting up the operating system, a setting value of a setting item for write-protecting based on an address in the PCI-Express for accessing to a setting item that prohibits writing into the start-up firmware, among setting items included in the start-up firmware;
- activating the operating system;
- and
- in accordance with control of the operating system, acquiring the setting value copied to the portion of the memory space provided in the predetermined region of the volatile memory after activating the operating system, without executing a setup menu of the start-up firmware.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.