M o t h e r b o a r d
OWNER’S HANDBOOK 5/7
BIOS
The system BIOS is contained in a flash memory device on the
motherboard. The BIOS provides the power-on self test (POST),
the BIOS Setup program, and the PCI and IDE auto-configuration
utilities.
The BIOS is always shadowed. Shadowing allows BIOS routines to
be executed from fast 64-bit onboard DRAM instead of from the
slower 8-bit flash memory device.
PCI auto configuration
If you install a PCI add-in board in your computer, the PCI auto-
configuration utility in the BIOS automatically detects and
configures the resources (IRQs, DMA channels, and I/O space) for
that add-in board. You do not need to run the BIOS Setup program
after you install a PCI add-in board.
However, PCI add-in boards use the same IRQ resources as ISA
add-in boards. If you install both a PCI and an ISA add-in board,
you must specify the IRQ used by the ISA card. The PCI auto
configuration program complies with version 2.1 of the PCI BIOS
specification.
IDE auto configuration
If you install an IDE device (e.g., a hard drive) in your computer,
the IDE auto-configuration utility in the BIOS automatically
detects and configures the device for your computer. You do not
need to run the BIOS Setup program after installing an IDE device.
ISA
A plug and play capability
The motherboard provides auto configuration of Plug and Play ISA
cards and resource management for legacy (non-Plug and Play) ISA
cards when used with the ISA Configuration Utility (ICU) or a
Plug and Play compatible operating system like Windows 95. To
obtain the ICU, contact your computer supplier.
