First, let me say that there are a LOT of questions here... Don't feel obligated to answer them all, and please don't flame me.. I'm very new at this, and I'm very overwhelmed. I recently built my first computer, and I am having a [sarcasm/] wonderful [/end=sarcasm] time slogging through the BIOS settings. Those with knowledge of basic Pheonix Award BIOS can help me the most here... Thank you for your time!!! Here is what I'm working with:
Soltek SL-K8AN2-GR socket 754 nFORCE3 250Gb
Athlon 64 2800+
Sapphire Radeon 9800 pro 128MB DDR 256bit 8x/4x AGP (I know this sucks. I'm upgrading to an X800 Pro soon)
Corsair 512 MB DDR PC-3200 (Christmas will *hopefully* bring me a gig of better low latency ram)
Sorry for the long post... you don't have to answer all of it; any help you can give me will be highly appreciated. There are simply some terms I have never heard before, and I'm a little frightened to manipulate things I don't understand. If I'm asking about something trivial, feel free to let me know.
Let me start with the most important questions... a. How do I backup my current BIOS so I don't screw it up when I upgrade? b. My multiplier is weird. (see question 4.0) Conventional techniques for raising it don't seem to apply here. Does anyone know what I'm doing wrong? c. As I oc my CPU, I know I need to raise the voltage. However, there are two places I can do this. (See question 4.1) Which one do I use, and how do I know when to raise it?
1. ADVANCED BIOS FEATURES
1.0 APIC mode. What is this? Should I enable it?
1.1 OS select for DRAM. What is the difference between no OS/2 and using it?
ADVANCED CHIPSET FEATURES
2.0 Special I/O for PCI Card. I know my vid card is AGP. But since I'm upgrading to PCI soon, I might as well learn what this is.
2.1 HT Frequency. I know this is hyper transport. But how high should I set it? I can get it up to 4x without much trouble, but 5x makes my system unstable.
2.2 DRAM configuration - Max Memclock - 1T/2T Memory Timing - CAS# Latency - RAS# to CAS# Active time - Row preharge time. All of these made me want to cry for my mommy....
INTEGRATED PERIPHRIALS
3.0 Onchip USB settings... Wha? Does this matter?
3.1 UART mode. What is this, and should I enable it?
3.2 Onboard Parallel port.... I'm stumped yet again.
And here are the real toughies that only a veteran of Pheonix could probably answer...
4.0 I can't seem to locate my multiplier. I found something in Frequency/Voltage control called the CPU ratio that looks like this: Default, 4x800, 5x1000, 10x2000 etc. Is this it? I tried manipulating it from default to 4x, but my ghrz went waaay down. Then I tried upping it to 10x, and it went back to normal. I tried upping it from there, and nothing happened.
4.1 When raising the voltage for my CPU, there seem to be two places I can do it. One is called CPU Vcore select, and the other is called chipset Vcore. Are these essentially the same? Which one should I manipulate?
4.2 This is probably trivial... but what should I set my video off method to in power management?
Once again, THANK YOU. I know you probably have better things to do than help a poor helpless n00b.. but I really do appreciate it.
Soltek SL-K8AN2-GR socket 754 nFORCE3 250Gb
Athlon 64 2800+
Sapphire Radeon 9800 pro 128MB DDR 256bit 8x/4x AGP (I know this sucks. I'm upgrading to an X800 Pro soon)
Corsair 512 MB DDR PC-3200 (Christmas will *hopefully* bring me a gig of better low latency ram)
Sorry for the long post... you don't have to answer all of it; any help you can give me will be highly appreciated. There are simply some terms I have never heard before, and I'm a little frightened to manipulate things I don't understand. If I'm asking about something trivial, feel free to let me know.
Let me start with the most important questions... a. How do I backup my current BIOS so I don't screw it up when I upgrade? b. My multiplier is weird. (see question 4.0) Conventional techniques for raising it don't seem to apply here. Does anyone know what I'm doing wrong? c. As I oc my CPU, I know I need to raise the voltage. However, there are two places I can do this. (See question 4.1) Which one do I use, and how do I know when to raise it?
1. ADVANCED BIOS FEATURES
1.0 APIC mode. What is this? Should I enable it?
1.1 OS select for DRAM. What is the difference between no OS/2 and using it?
ADVANCED CHIPSET FEATURES
2.0 Special I/O for PCI Card. I know my vid card is AGP. But since I'm upgrading to PCI soon, I might as well learn what this is.
2.1 HT Frequency. I know this is hyper transport. But how high should I set it? I can get it up to 4x without much trouble, but 5x makes my system unstable.
2.2 DRAM configuration - Max Memclock - 1T/2T Memory Timing - CAS# Latency - RAS# to CAS# Active time - Row preharge time. All of these made me want to cry for my mommy....
INTEGRATED PERIPHRIALS
3.0 Onchip USB settings... Wha? Does this matter?
3.1 UART mode. What is this, and should I enable it?
3.2 Onboard Parallel port.... I'm stumped yet again.
And here are the real toughies that only a veteran of Pheonix could probably answer...
4.0 I can't seem to locate my multiplier. I found something in Frequency/Voltage control called the CPU ratio that looks like this: Default, 4x800, 5x1000, 10x2000 etc. Is this it? I tried manipulating it from default to 4x, but my ghrz went waaay down. Then I tried upping it to 10x, and it went back to normal. I tried upping it from there, and nothing happened.
4.1 When raising the voltage for my CPU, there seem to be two places I can do it. One is called CPU Vcore select, and the other is called chipset Vcore. Are these essentially the same? Which one should I manipulate?
4.2 This is probably trivial... but what should I set my video off method to in power management?
Once again, THANK YOU. I know you probably have better things to do than help a poor helpless n00b.. but I really do appreciate it.
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