GA-P35-DS3R BIOS Settings - Need Help

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Jason W
Posts: 140
Joined: Wed Nov 01, 2006 12:54 pm
Location: Houston, TX

GA-P35-DS3R BIOS Settings - Need Help

Post by Jason W » Fri Aug 17, 2007 11:25 pm

I have my PC built (first time builder), everything is plugged in, and everything appears to be functioning properly. The system powers up, the Nexus fans spin up, and the POST screen accurately shows my CPU and amount of RAM. It also shows I have the F4 BIOS version already, so I assume I don't need to flash the BIOS or anything.

I have not configured anything yet, installed Windows XP, or anything like that. Instead of just going forward and installing windows and charging forward, I am looking for advice on my BIOS settings.

Here's a quick run-down of my PC:

P182 case
3 Nexus 120mm fans (rear exhaust, video card, lower chamber - top fan opening covered)
Corsair HX520 power supply
GA-P35-DS3R motherboard
E6750 CPU
Fanless Ninja Rev. B heat sink (push-pin attachment) - no fan attached
2 x 1GB of G.Skill 2GBHZ DDR2 800 RAM (4-4-4-12 timings)
Gigabyte Fanless GeForce 7600GS video card
Samsung SH-S203B SATA DVD burner on GSATAII 0 port
Mitsumi combo 3.5" floppy / USB 2.0 flash card reader
WD1600YS 160GB hard drive on SATAII 0 port (OS drive)
WD5000ABYS 500GB hard drive on SATAII 2 port (data drive)
WD1600YS 160GB hard drive on SATAII 1 port (Photoshop cache drive)
eSATA bracket connected to SATAII 4 port
WD5000ABYS 500GB hard drive inside Antec MX-1 external enclosure (data backup drive)

I am assuming that before I go any further, I should go into the BIOS and change the settings. So this is where I'm at currently. As I look around at the settings, some I understand and some I don't. For the ones I don't understand, I am finding that the manual isn't very helpful. As such, I am turning to the helpful folks here for help. The following are the areas I need help.

Standard CMOS Features Screen
No questions here.

Advanced BIOS Features
1. Since I have not installed an operating system, formatted hard drives, or anything yet, what should I set as my first boot device, second boot device, and thrid boot device?

2. Any point enabling HDD S.M.A.R.T. Capability?

3. Any point enabling No'Execute Memory Protect?

4. I assume I want to disable CPU Enhanced Halt (C1E) if I want to overclock, correct? Any reason to enable it?

5. I assume I want to disable CPU EIST Function if I want to overclock, correct? Any reason to enable it?

6. Virtualization Technology - what is this? The BIOS says the following: "When enabled, a VMM can utilize the additional hardware capabilities provided by Virtualization Technology". Should I enable this?

Integrated Peripherals
1. I am going to make a floppy that has the ICH9R SATA drivers so that I can configure the ICH9R SATA controller to run in AHCI mode, to take full advantage of my SATA hard drives. When do I insert the floppy in the floppy drive to load the drivers?

2. If I am using a USB keyboard and a USB mouse, I assume I need to set USB Keyboard Support and USB Mouse Support to Enabled, correct?

3. With my hardware, I can disable Legacy USB Storage Detect, correct?

4. I have no idea what setting to set for Onboard LAN Boot ROM. The motherboard manual says it allows me to decide whether to activate the boot ROM integrated with the onboard LAN chip. It's showing disabled currently... is this okay?

Power Management Setup
1. I am not sure which selection to choose for the ACPI Suspend Type - S1(POS) or S3(STR). I do not want the PC to go into a sleep state, as I do not leave my PC on overnight or sleep with it in my bedroom. Is the S1(POS) selection what I should do?

PnP/PCI Configurations
Is there any reason not to have the Resources Controlled By set to Auto?

PC Health Status
1. Does the P182 case have a built-in speaker? I couldn't find a front-panel speaker connector. I ask because I figure it's pointless to set a CPU Warning Temperature if there is no speaker on the front panel of the P182 case. Or will the warning come through my speakers which will be hooked up to the on-board audio? If so, then what temperature should I set it to?

2. Which fan headers does the Smart FAN Control Method, if set to Enabled, control?

MB Intelligent Tweaker (M.I.T.)
1. With my graphics card, should I set the Robust Graphics Booster to anything but Auto (other choices are Fast and Turbo)? I'm not a gamer, nor do I do 3D modeling or video editing/rendering. Photoshop CS3 will be my most intensive program.

2. I assume the CPU Host Frequency (MHz) is the CPU FSB that I change to overclock the CPU, correct? It was set to 100 when I first got to this screen, and if I'm assuming correctly what this feature is, then it seems that the setting should have been showing 333 to get to the stock CPU speed of 2.6GHz (333 x 8 multiplier).

3. I read somewhere that the PCI Express Frequency (MHz) should be locked in at 100 rather than set to Auto if overclocking. Is this correct? Why not have it set to Auto?

4. Judging from the description of what C.I.A.2 does, I should disable this functionality if I plan to overclock, correct?

5. The motherboard manual says the High Speed DRAM DLL setting can be set to Option 1 or Option 2, but doesn't go into details of what each option is. How do I know which option to choose?

6. I am assuming that the following DRAM timings are the ones I want to set to 4-4-4-12 as specified by G.Skill for my RAM: CAS Latency Time; DRAM RAS# to CAS# Delay; DRAM RAS# Precharge; Precharge Delay (tRAS). Is this correct?

7. Any reason not to set the following DRAM timings to Auto: ACT to ACT Delay (tRRD) - Auto sets this to 11
Rank Write to READ Delay - Auto sets this to 5
Write to Precharge Delay - Auto sets this to 10
Read to Precharge Delay - Auto sets this to 5
tRD - Auto sets this to 7
tRD Phase Adjustment - Auto sets this to 0

8. The motherboard has set the Refresh to ACT Delay at a value of 46. This setting allows me to choose any value between 0 and 255. Any reason not to leave it at 46?

9. If my RAM is specified to be at 2.0 to 2.1 volts, do I need to choose the +0.2V setting for the DDR2 OverVoltage Control?

10. The PCI-E OverVoltage Control is set to Normal. The options are +.1V, +.2V, or +.3V. Should I leave it at Normal?

11. The FSB OverVoltage Control is set to Normal. The options are the same as for PCI-E OverVoltage Control. Should I leave it at Normal?

12. The (G)MCH OverVoltage Control is set to Normal. The options are the same as PCI-E OverVoltage Control and FSB OverVoltage Control. Should I leave it at Normal?

13. The CPU Voltage Control is set to Normal. This is where I can under or over volt the CPU, correct? Right underneath this, in blue writing (read only), it shows Normal CPU Vcore as 1.31250V. Is this okay? If I change the CPU Voltage to something other than Normal, will the BIOS display something other than 1.31250V here?

I know I have a lot of questions above. If you've read to here I applaud you. Please take the additional time to try and help me figure this BIOS out and what settings I need at stock speeds, as well when overclocked. I am shooting for 3.2GHz with my current fan setup.

With the side of my case off while I typed all of the above, the BIOS is showing the Current System Temperature to stay at about 36 degrees C, with the Current CPU Temperature staying around 36 degrees C as well. When I put the side of the case back on, the Current System Temp rises to about 38 degrees C and the Current CPU Temp rises to about 38 degrees C. Are these good temps? All three Nexus fans are running at a full 12V and the BIOS is reporting the RPMs to be between 1025 and 1060 RPM each.

Regards.

Jason

Drexl
Posts: 26
Joined: Sat Aug 11, 2007 9:01 pm

Post by Drexl » Sat Aug 18, 2007 7:39 pm

I'll try to answer what I can. About the BIOS:

1. Set the DVD drive as the first boot device if you're installing Windows, with your primary hard drive (where the OS will go) as the second. This way, the Windows setup DVD will boot for the initial setup, and when it reboots it can still boot to the HDD. After you've installed you can change it so the primary HDD is first, but it's not necessary.

BTW, I think you may have to connect the DVD drive to one of the native (non-Gigabyte) SATA ports. I would think that the Gigabyte ports need a driver, and you won't be able to boot the Windows disc from them (since you need to boot from the setup disc in order to install the driver for Windows in the first place). If you really have your heart set on all the HDDs being on the native SATA ports, you could move the DVD drive back after Windows and the Gigabyte driver are installed, but I would just leave it on a native port for later reinstalls. I could be wrong though - check to see if you can boot from a Gigabyte port.

2. Yes, SMART can warn you if a HDD is going bad. If you want monitoring in Windows you need special SMART software, but even without it the board will still check when booting up and warn you then. I think the impact on performance is negligible so I would enable it.

3. It's for Intel's Execute Disable Bit and I would enable it, because it may help protect from some malware such as buffer overflow attacks.

4. Disable it at first until you've tested to see if the system is stable. It's an advanced halt state function that causes the CPU to use less power when issued a halt command (often when idle).

5. It's another power-savings option that clocks down the CPU when full power is not needed. Again I would disable this until you decide on a CPU speed.

6. It's for Intel's virtualization technology for software that runs virtual machines such as Virtual PC or VMware, but I guess it can't hurt to enable it.

Integrated Peripherals:

1. Insert the floppy just before you install Windows so it's there when you need to press F6 (which is right at the beginning, at least with XP).

2. This is for legacy OS (such as MS-DOS) support of USB mouse and keyboard, which may be necessary for something like a BIOS update. Otherwise you could disable it.

3. This is to support other USB devices in legacy OSes, so you can disable it. However, enabling this may allow you to update BIOS from a USB flash drive instead of a floppy disk which would be more convenient.

4. That's for booting from a LAN instead of the HDD, which I doubt you'll be doing so keep it disabled.

PMS:

1. It looks like the S1 keeps the system running in a low power state, while S3 is a more complete suspend which will shut off everything after a certain amount of time when the system is idle. Bear in mind that the system doesn't have to be doing much to keep it "alive" - even just uTorrent keeps it out of suspend mode. Anyway, I believe the time before suspend is set in Windows.

PnP/PCI: probably not, leave it at auto.

PC Health Status:

1. I don't know, but you could always buy a PC speaker if feel you need it. I don't think the warning will play through the audio unless you have a sound card with a PC speaker connector.

2. Check the board manual. It's usually the CPU, power, and chassis fans but this can vary based the board and your components, as well as how you've connected the fans (obviously they need to be connected to the board in order to be monitored and adjusted this way).

MB IT:

1. I'd like to know the answer to this as well!

2. Yes, this should be set to 333 in your case for the default setting. I don't know why it was 100 - perhaps it just hadn't detected everything properly? Did the bootup screen show the proper CPU speed?

3. The devices expect 100MHz and could be damaged if it's set higher.

4. This actually is for overclocking, but it's simplified. It looks like it only changes the FSB while leaving the voltages, memory timing, etc. alone. Disable it if you will overclocking "manually" and fine tuning.

5. Beats me.

6. Yes.

7. I don't know about these. I'd leave them alone.

8. Again, not sure.

I really don't know about the voltage settings, so someone else will have to tackle those.

BTW, nice system. I'm building one that's similar to it with the same PSU, CPU, and maybe even the same video card (though the case is a Solo), but I'm getting the DS3P motherboard because it has Dual BIOS (backup for a bad flash).

Jason W
Posts: 140
Joined: Wed Nov 01, 2006 12:54 pm
Location: Houston, TX

Post by Jason W » Sat Aug 18, 2007 7:48 pm

Thank you very much for the reply.

If someone can tackle the items neither myself nor Drexl can answer, it would be greatly appreciated.

BTW - I am going through the installation of Windows XP Pro right now, with my SATA DVD burner on the GSATA2 controller. Seems to be working fine. I did not set this controller to AHCI or RAID mode in the BIOS. So far so good!

Can't wait to get everything installed and begin stress testing and overclocking...

Jason

Drexl
Posts: 26
Joined: Sat Aug 11, 2007 9:01 pm

Post by Drexl » Sat Sep 08, 2007 7:12 pm

So how did it go? I got my DS3P up and running a few days ago and it's been working fine. I have the e6750 overclocked to 3.2 Ghz (400x8). So far the only tweak I've done is lower the CPU voltage to the upper end of the recommended voltage for the chip. The board had it set higher. I have not adjusted any memory voltages yet.

According to a review I read, the Robust Graphics Booster is apparently raising the PCIe frequency based on load. They claimed it doesn't affect stability, so it may be safe to use. If you're not a PC gamer though I wouldn't bother.

I've found an odd quirk where sometimes when you change one of the overclocking settings and save, the board won't reboot and the power button won't turn it on. Don't worry; just cut the power by pressing the master power button on the back of the PSU off and then back on, then you can turn on the computer (and the settings you changed will stick).

Oh, in case you didn't know, you have to press Ctrl+F1 to access the advanced settings in the M.I.T. section of the BIOS. Do it when you're in the BIOS but not in that section, then when you go to the section you'll see more options.

Konnetikut
Posts: 153
Joined: Sat Jan 13, 2007 10:14 pm
Location: Vancouver
Contact:

Post by Konnetikut » Sat Sep 08, 2007 7:26 pm

About memory voltage... default is 1.8v - so yes, set to +0.2 for 2.0v.
Feel free to ask again if you have more questions - I have the P35-DS3R with a Q6600 and Crucial Ballistix PC2-6400 memory. (8x400 - 3.2GHz)

Deporange
Posts: 2
Joined: Mon Sep 10, 2007 5:52 am

Post by Deporange » Mon Sep 10, 2007 6:01 am

Hi, I'll be using similar components for a quiet, photo-editing box (plus maybe some video-editing), not a gamer: q6600, 4gb Ballistix 6400, samsung 320gb raid 0 2x Hitachi 500gb...

I'm having difficulty deciding between the gigabyte mobos DS3R and DS3P. Besides the difference in Firewire and the PCI ports, is there a reason the DS3P is more suited to quad-core with non-extreme overclock, eg 3.0-3.4? Your thoughts are appreciated!

Jason W
Posts: 140
Joined: Wed Nov 01, 2006 12:54 pm
Location: Houston, TX

Post by Jason W » Mon Sep 10, 2007 6:22 am

PC is up and running. Overclocked to 3.2 GHz and fully stable for 24 hours running Orthos. I have my Vcore set to 1.250V in the BIOS (CPU-Z reports 1.200V at idle), and my RAM voltage set to +0.2V in the BIOS. All other voltages are left at the "Normal" setting.

It's a quiet machine, but not silent... I have 4 Nexus fans spinning at the full 12V. Still a world of difference in sound over my old PC, so I'm letting it go like this for now. CPU cores idle around 34-38 degrees C using Core Temp 0.95.4, and never get over 60 degrees C while running Orthos or Prime 95.

I'm happy.

jeepescu
Posts: 45
Joined: Tue Aug 15, 2006 10:58 am
Location: montreal

Post by jeepescu » Mon Sep 10, 2007 8:36 am

You're Golfnut on dpreview, right ?
Congrats for the nice build, I'll be able to talk about overclocking in a while when I complete my build.

Jason W
Posts: 140
Joined: Wed Nov 01, 2006 12:54 pm
Location: Houston, TX

Post by Jason W » Mon Sep 10, 2007 11:12 am

jeepescu wrote:You're Golfnut on dpreview, right ?
Congrats for the nice build, I'll be able to talk about overclocking in a while when I complete my build.
Yep, that's me. Thanks for the nice words on my build. I'm happy with it so far...

Drexl
Posts: 26
Joined: Sat Aug 11, 2007 9:01 pm

Post by Drexl » Mon Sep 10, 2007 12:09 pm

Deporange wrote:I'm having difficulty deciding between the gigabyte mobos DS3R and DS3P. Besides the difference in Firewire and the PCI ports, is there a reason the DS3P is more suited to quad-core with non-extreme overclock, eg 3.0-3.4? Your thoughts are appreciated!
The DS3P also has Dual BIOS, which will copy a backup BIOS over the main BIOS in case of a bad flash. That's the only other difference AFAIK. They both have the same overclocking options and heatsinks for the chips.

Deporange
Posts: 2
Joined: Mon Sep 10, 2007 5:52 am

Post by Deporange » Mon Sep 10, 2007 12:53 pm

Drexl wrote:The DS3P also has Dual BIOS, which will copy a backup BIOS over the main BIOS in case of a bad flash. That's the only other difference AFAIK. They both have the same overclocking options and heatsinks for the chips.
Thanks. I've found this comparison (dated May-07) to be helpful, highlighting a number of differences http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/sho ... tcount=128.

Can anyone determine any errors here? For example, I believe subsequently the DS3P has lost the copper cooling, replaced with the same aluminum cooling system of the DS3R. It also appears DS3P supports eSATA2 via bracket, while DS3R does not. Any other updates?

Drexl
Posts: 26
Joined: Sat Aug 11, 2007 9:01 pm

Post by Drexl » Sat Sep 15, 2007 5:30 pm

A few more observations:

The BIOS is not detecting my drives - sorta. In the "Standard CMOS Features" section anyway, when I installed a new drive (which replaced the previous one), it's not detecting any of the drives including the DVD-ROM. However, when I go to the section with the boot order, the drive is listed. I think this may be because I switched to using AHCI mode, and previously the drives were detected when in PATA mode. The AHCI BIOS detects the drives fine. So, don't be alarmed if you see no drives being detected in the BIOS in that section if you're using AHCI.

About the Intel chipset drivers and the AHCI driver (this may only apply to Vista, and 64-bit Vista at that): I had installed the Intel chipset drivers first as always, and when I went to install the Matrix Storage Manager driver (for AHCI), the installer tells you that the version you have is newer (8.3 vs 7.6 or something like that).

However, I think they made a mistake here in detecting the driver versions. The driver that the chipset driver package installs is from January 2007 and has 4-5 files, one of which is atapi.sys and others with similar names that I don't recall. When I tried going ahead and installing the MSM driver with the "lower" version number, it installed a driver called "iaStor.sys" instead with a date of July 2007. I think the installer is incorrect and sees the generic driver with its higher version number as being the later driver when it really is not. Anyway, I reinstalled Vista for the new hard drive, and this time I installed the MSM driver before the chipset drivers. Sure enough, the chipset drivers did not overwrite the MSM driver.

The system should work fine regardless of whether you bother with installing chipset/AHCI drivers or not, but I thought I'd mention this for those of us who want to make sure we have the latest drivers for everything.

Also, some of my overclocking settings were reset after installing the new drive, so check for that and change them back if necessary.

Yes, the DS3P comes with the bracket for eSATA, but for some reason the labels are upside-down when it's installed in a standard tower system. :?

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