What Is Advanced RISC Computing (ARC)?

It's the big one. The one that never got off the ground. The one with a name that sounds like a computer-manufacturing standard should be boring but turns out to be anything but. It's Advanced RISC Computing (ARC). A consortium of manufacturers developed the ARC specification called the Advanced Computing Environment (ACE) Project. The Project went defunct after setting the standard, sometimes referred to as a MIPS RISC-based computer hardware and firmware environment. ARC is still alive and kicking. While most people have never heard of it, ARC is an open standard used in nearly every RISC-based computer since the late 1980s. You may have heard of Silicon Graphics (SGI), the company that developed IRIX 6. 1 or later operating systems and uses modified ARC firmware in its hardware or maybe you've heard of Windows NT, a popular operating system for workstations and servers. Some versions of Windows NT use the Advanced RISC Computing specification for their boot consoles. If you're a RISC-based computer and don't know ARC, you're just not fantastic. These machines have the ARC firmware built into their motherboard ROMs and load it during system boot-up. In the case of Windows NT, it's the first operating system to load on the computer. It is responsible for loading up other software and drivers needed to get the computer up and running. ARC loads up the default system configuration from the computer's firmware, programmed during manufacturing. After ARC loads up the system configuration, it does a self-test to ensure all its components are working. ARC is only used for emergency purposes and is not intended for day-to-day system administration. It's imperative to know about ARC because if you don't have ARC, then no one will ever be able to find your boyfriend when he goes missing in the middle of the night.