Build Your Own PC

by David Risley
STEP 22 : Configure The BIOS
Now, your new PC should be up and running and you should be staring at the BIOS setup screen.
The following procedure will walk you through this initial setup. Please bear in mind that this serves as an outline.
Your actual settings and names may vary for different BIOS versions. I discuss BIOS options in more detail in the
BIOS section of the site. Below, you will simply find an outline of what to plug in now for the purposes of getting a
new PC in operation.
1. Auto-detect your Hard Drive. Just about all somewhat modern BIOS versions are capable of auto-detecting
the hard drive and using the DriveID command to find and configure it in the BIOS. You should see a
menu option for this, such as IDE HDD Auto Detection. Go ahead and do this now. If it does not
successfully detect the drive, then make sure the drive is properly connected, because it probably isn't. The
BIOS will auto-detect your drive and offer you three options to choose from. Usually, just choose the first
option at the top of the list, the one that says "LBA". It will then try to auto-detect your other drives,
whether they are there are not. Pressing escape will skip the detection of drives that are not there.
2. Now enter the "Standard CMOS" option. Configure the following items:
The date and time. The date is in MM/DD/YY format, and the time is in 24- hour format, like "military-
time".
Drive IDE settings: Type: Probably set to "User"
Heads/Sectors, etc...leave these set to the values determined by Auto-Detect.
Make sure that any drives that are not physically present are set to NONE in the BIOs, so that it does not
try to find those drives on every boot-up.
Translation Mode: Modern drives are set to LBA, the older drives below 500MB or so are set to Normal, or
CHS.
Block Mode: Disabled on most systems
PIO Mode: Usually auto-detected, but most drive should be set to PIO mode 3.
Floppy Drive(s): Just set the correct type, like 1.44MB, 720K, etc. If there is an option for Floppy Drive B:,
leave it disabled unless you actually have a second floppy drive.
Video Display: Set to VGA
Halt On: "All errors", to be sure you see all errors
3. Now, go into "Advanced Features", its all the same thing:
Virus Protection/Warning: Disable
Internal Cache: Enable. If you can't, then this is a hardware problem.
External (or L2) Cache: Enable.
Quick POST: Disable to make sure all tests are performed on boot-up, but you can enable it, sacrificing
valuable tests, but increasing boot speed.
Boot Sequence: Best left at A:, C:, SCSI
Swap Floppy Drive: If your floppies are set in the correct locations on the floppy ribbon cable, you will not
need to enable this. If your a: and b: are reversed, though, you can enable this.
Fast A20: Disable
Video/System BIOS Shadow: Disable now for minimum problems.
Boot Numlock: Enable to have Numlock on when you start the computer.
CPU Serial Number: Enables or disables the serial number thingie in Intel CPUs. Privacy buffs, disable it.
4. Go to the "Chipset Advanced Features" menu:
Chipset Special Features: Disable
Cache Timing: leave at "Auto", the default
L2 Cache size: Set it to match the size of your external cache.
DRAM Parity Checking: Enable only if using parity memory
Dram parity/ECC mode: "Parity" if using parity memory, "ECC" if using ECC memory
DRAM speed/Timing: Set to "Auto", or speed of memory. For SDRAM, you probably won't see 10ns
listed, just choose "Auto", the memory runs at the correct speed.
AGP Mode: Set to Auto
AGP Aperture: 64 MB is usually fine, but depends on the amount of memory you have.
 DRAM Frequency: Set to the speed of your memory (66, 100, 133)
Disable all other options, or leave at default.
5. Disable Power Management Features for now.
6. Set PCI/PnP Configuration Settings. If using Windows 9x, set the PnP Aware OS to enabled. All other
options set to Auto, or disable if "Auto" is not available.
7. Go to "Integrated Peripherals". Configure these items:
Integrated Floppy Controller: Enable.
Integrated IDE/ HDD Controller: Enable those you are using. Most likely, you have a hard drive on
controller 1 and a CD-ROM on controller 2, so enable both.
Integrated Serial Port. Both COM 1 and COM 2 are usually enabled.
Integrated Parallel Port: Enable on most systems.
Parallel Port Mode: Set to either EPP or ECP or both.
PS/2 Mouse: Set to "Auto" if available, otherwise, enable if using a PS/2 mouse.
USB: Disable on most systems, but enable if actually using USB.
If you have any onboard audio, you will probably find an enable/disable option for this too. Do what you
want.
8. If you are using a "jumperless" motherboard equipped with "SoftMenu", enter this option and configure the
following items:
CPU Operating Speed. Setting this will automatically set the External Clock and Multiplier Settings.
External Clock: Set to the bus speed of your system.
Multiplier Factor: Set it. Obvious.
CPU Power Plane: Set to either dual voltage or single voltage. Most modern chips use dual voltage, one for
core, one for I/O.
I/O Voltage: Set to appropriate voltage for your chip. If there's an AUTO option, that's fine, unless you're
overclocking and want to beef up the voltage.
Core Voltage: Set to appropriate voltage for your chip.
9. Save and Exit the BIOS setup program. This will reboot the machine. Make sure your system disk is still in
Drive A:.