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#11
It really doesn't matter, desktop or laptop. What we are talking about is a delay allowed by the bios for the user to press a key to either enter bios setup or choose the boot device. That is a function 100% of the bios and cannot be changed by Windows for two reasons:
1. Whatever delay function setting the bios uses to either insert a delay, not insert a delay, or determine the length of the delay is stored in EPROM. The address where the value is stored in EPROM and what that value represents can be anywhere and anything in EPROM. For Windows to change that it would have to know what address the setting is stored at and what the value represents and that is simply impossible. Write the wrong value to the wrong address and the entire bios can become corrupted, more often than not requiring EPROM chip replacement.
2. The delay that bios inserts to allow a key to be pressed for setup or boot device choice occurs before any boot files are loaded from any source. Thus that delay cannot be affected by Windows.
Now - there can be a delay built into the boot loader to allow the boot loader to hand off booting to a different source and that is a function of the operating system and Windows can certainly interfere with that. But it is impossible for the operating system to interfere with bios created delays.
If it is a desktop take out the battery on the MB for a few secs and hold down the power button.