Bios Settings for Dummies

[Menzo]

Hey tech heads - anyone have a link to a site that recommends the best bios settings (things like AGP aperture size, RAM latency, and all that other geeky stuff) for dummies like me who haven't ever built a PC from scratch?

I got my new entertainment PC up and running on the Biostar 200N small formfactor barebones, AMD 2600+ and ATI All-in-Wonder 9600.

[Bleeding Edge]

Adrian's Rojak Pot has the most comprehensive Bios guide:
http://www.rojakpot.com/main.aspx

While this article at Tweak3D is more of a step by step guide:
http://www.tweak3d.net/tweak/cpu/

[JeffL]

Hey Adam, what is the motherboard in your machine?

What I've found to be the most effective advice is going to the forums at AMDMB.com and reading and asking in the specific forum for your MB.

[DennyA]

The Biostar is a Small Form Factor cube. (I have one too.) Custom motherboard.

The AMDMB folks are helpful for general chipset questions with the 200N, but not many readers of the board seem to have them. But you can probably find good BIOS info there.

The best place for 200N specific information is the forums at www.sfftech.com.

One mine, I did play around with overclocking a bit just to see what I could do, but I'm running-day-to-day at stock speeds. I think the main BIOS tweaks to make are to turn off the motherboard and video card BIOS shadowing features (apparently they actually slow things down under XP) and to set the AGP aperture to half the size of your installed RAM.

[Menzo]

Very helpful, thanks.

And for aspiring Entertainment Center PC enthusiasts such as myself, let me know if you want to start up a mini discussion about interesting tools and such. Last night I found MyHTPC that seems to be a good addition to SnapStream. I just wish Apple would make a TV-style front end for iTunes.

[Gladguy]

Hi there... mind if I cut in? :)

I'm having some BIOS quandries, myself.

I've got an Athlon XP 2800 (Barton), PC3700 RAM, and the A7N8X rev1 mobo, just flashed to BIOS 1007. Prior to the flash, the max CPU External Frequency setting in the BIOS was 166 MHz. Both the BIOS and Windows saw the CPU as "Unknown CPU" running at 2.09 GHz (I think... something like that anyway).

Since the flash to 1007, I have the ability to set the CPU to 200 MHz, which I've done. I recall reading somewhere it's beneficial to run CPU and RAM at the same frequency. Now, both BIOS and Windows see the CPU as AMD Athlon. Problem is, it only seems to be running at 1.25 GHz. I changed no other settings.

Any tips?

[Bull]

I've got an Athlon XP 2800 (Barton), PC3700 RAM, and the A7N8X rev1 mobo, just flashed to BIOS 1007. Prior to the flash, the max CPU External Frequency setting in the BIOS was 166 MHz. Both the BIOS and Windows saw the CPU as "Unknown CPU" running at 2.09 GHz (I think... something like that anyway).

Since the flash to 1007, I have the ability to set the CPU to 200 MHz, which I've done. I recall reading somewhere it's beneficial to run CPU and RAM at the same frequency. Now, both BIOS and Windows see the CPU as AMD Athlon. Problem is, it only seems to be running at 1.25 GHz. I changed no other settings.

Any tips?

You've underclocked your CPU. Set it back to 166FSB.

It's been awhile since I looked into this, but isn't PC3700 RAM rated for 333Mhz? which is a parallel frequency for a CPU with a FSB of 166, I believe.

[Gladguy]

You've underclocked your CPU. Set it back to 166FSB.

It's been awhile since I looked into this, but isn't PC3700 RAM rated for 333Mhz? which is a parallel frequency for a CPU with a FSB of 166, I believe.
Underclocked? 166FSB is faster than 200FSB?

Anyways, I get the same result at 166 or 200 -- 1.25 GHz.

And I made a typo... I've got PC3200 RAM which runs at 200 MHz.

[Bull]

I'm trying to say that clearly the changes you've made have underclocked the CPU if it was running at 2.09 GHz previously and now it is running at 1.25 Ghz.

What you want to do is find out what the rated speed is for your chip. I believe it's supposed to run at 2.083GHz with a 333Mhz FSB.

If you've got PC3200 RAM, I think it's actually rated to run at 400mhz. At any rate, you're trying to run the memory at 166 so it's running parallel to the frequency for FSB. IOW, you have to underclock your RAM.

[SpoofyChop]

My motherboard's specs say that the Athlon XP 2800+ has an FSB of 166Mhz and a multiplier of 12.5x which yields 2075Mhz.

So it would seem that 166 is the correct FSB, but if you're only getting 1250Mhz then your multiplier is probably only set at 7.5 somehow.

[EDIT: Also, if I understand correctly, 333Mhz fsb is actually 166Mhz double-pumped. I have no idea what the hell that means though. :( ]

[EDIT 2: I'm going to read this link and you should too!]

http://www.directron.com/fsbguide.html