"While it may seem that PC hardware beeps when it is powered on as a matter of course, in fact, there's a bit of code that makes that beep happen. That piece of code is the boot firmware. On most PCs, it's called the BIOS. (The word is an acronym for basic input/output system.) The BIOS provides the underlying hardware support that early x86 operating systems used to access disks, monitors, and just about everything else..."
