BIOS: 8 Mb Flash ROM, AMI BIOS, PnP, DMI2.0, WfM2.0, SM BIOS 2.3
Overclocking Features
- AI NOS™(Non-delay Overclocking System)
- AI Overclocking (intelligent CPU frequency tuner)
- CPU, Memory, and PCIe x16 voltage adjustable
- SFS (Stepless Frequency Selection) from 100MHz up to 400MHz at 1MHz increment
- Adjustable FSB/DDR ratio. Fixed PCI/PCIe frequencies.
- ASUS C.P.R. (CPU Parameter Recall)
There are a few setting that will not function properly if the BIOS is setup incorrectly, things such as RAID 0 and High-Definition audio are a few things to note along with a few other that are mostly user preference options. If you are using a strictly old school IDE configuration just about everything will auto-set the values to what it thinks the parameters should be. You can change the memory options to faster CAS and RAS rates depending on the performance capabilities of your memory, and remember the memory you use can have a great affect on your overall overclocking ability.
A RAID 0 based system must have a few parameters set correctly in order for the system to recognize the SATA drives used in your array. As you can see in the graph below in the first screen you come to in the BIOS there is a IDE configuration setting that must be entered and set correctly in order for the system to see your drives upon the boot-up sequence. There are three available settings to choose from in two categories, the thing is though choosing the right one is the key and that can be a bit confusing for the new system builder.
The top setting in the IDE configuration screen offers the setting, RAID, IDE or Enhanced Mode with each one functioning differently in conjunction with the setting right below it. For a RAID 0 Array to be detected by the system the configure SATA as setting must be set to RAID and ATA Serial BOOTROM set to enabled. The default setting is disabled and will cause you nothing but frustration if you forget this little detail. I spent about fifteen minutes figuring this out, as the manual doesn't clearly tell how to set the parameters for setting up a SATA RAID system.
For the overclocking tests I made use of the new 3.46GHz EE that came with my Intel test kit and we were quite satisfied with how well the CPU responded. Using Asus's AiBooster overclocking utility we were able to get some very solid results using just a Swiftech LGA775 air-cooler for CPU thermal protection. On this platform one thing to note is, although I use Crucial Ballistix memory for my test results in order to maintain integrity between systems for our comparison charts. I was actually able to get slightly better overclocking results using Corsair's Twin-X memory in this test platform. You can see the results below I was able to get to 3792 using the Ballistix and 3801 using the Corsair, which is pretty close by all standards, but the Corsair was just a bit more stable on the extreme high-end.
