Is it possible to access the BIOS without any memory installed?

[bcterps]

Here's an interesting situation. I bought 1 gig of Kingston HyperX PC3200 for my rig and I had a hell of a time getting it set up. I figured I could just plug em in and the board would boot up. However, I realized that the problem was that HyperX requires the VDIMM to be set at 2.6V, while my mobo has a default setting of 2.5V.

I was able to get the memory installed by using my old stick of memory, accessing the BIOS, changing the VDIMM, and then installing the new memory. All is well now.

What I'm worrying about is what happens if my BIOS settings get set back to default, or I have to clear my CMOS for whatever reason. Or even if I flash my BIOS, I can't remember if it changes everything back to its default settings.

In that case, I wouldn't be able to get my system to boot unless I could access the BIOS before installing the memory. Is this possible?

 

[Kalvin00]

When I put in some bad ram on this mobo, it would just give me a beep code with no mention of the BIOS. Of course, this is a very old mobo, so things could've changed..

 

[RReed]

No it's not possible, RAM is one of 3 things that are required to make a motherboard POST with the other being CPU and a video card. So with no POST no screen and no getting into BIOS.

 

[bcterps]

Originally posted by: RReed
No it's not possible, RAM is one of 3 things that are required to make a motherboard POST with the other being CPU and a video card. So with no POST no screen and no getting into BIOS.

Hmm, that sucks. I guess I better have a cheap spare stick of DDR around in case somethin screws up.

 

[sharkeeper]

Something is definitely wrong if the machine won't post at default voltage.

You can always MODBIN (edit) your ROM file so the default is anything you like.

-DAK-

 

[Bilo86]

No, RAM, CPU, and video card are the necessities for boot.

 

[bcterps]

Originally posted by: shuttleteam
Something is definitely wrong if the machine won't post at default voltage. You can always MODBIN (edit) your ROM file so the default is anything you like. -DAK-

Well I don't think anything is necessarily wrong. I wonder what the stand DDR spec requires though. My specific sticks that I bought state that they require 2.6V, while my mobo defaults to 2.5V. It's not that they are incompatible, they are working just fine, it's just the default voltage is different than what the memory specifies.

 

[bozo1]

They probably mean that you need to run them at 2.6 to achieve the advertised speed and timings. Your system should still POST with the mobo defaults.

 

[bcterps]

Hmm, that's interesting. Is the JEDEC spec for DDR 2.5V? I think I'll get on the horn with Kingston to see what they see about it.

 

[redhatlinux]

The JEDEC standard is 2.5V. You should have been able to get the system to POST at 2.5 and then set BIOS to 2.6v. Any chance that your mobo has a jumper for higher Vdimm, some do ??

 

[Viper96720]

My asus could get into bios without a cpu installed