Part 3: Setting The BIOS

Now that you have selected your hardware and put it all together, we have to properly configure your BIOS. The BIOS (Basic Input/Output System) is a low-level method to handle your hardware. It allows you to enable, disable and tweak any hardware that is connected to your motherboard. Each BIOS has different settings, so I will write about the important features that are practically universal among all BIOS's.

TIDBIT: BIOS settings are stored in the CMOS. In turn the CMOS is powered by a small battery. If this battery is removed for an extended period of time (under 10 minutes), all of your BIOS settings will be erased.

Getting Into The BIOS

Accessing the BIOS is relatively easy. Once the computer is turned on, you will see a screen with the BIOS's logo on it (usually). More than likely it will display the information to you, but you may have to press a few random buttons. Some of the common buttons are the function keys (F1, F2, F3, etc...), Escape (Esc) or even sometimes it can be one of the Insert, Home, Page Up or Page Down keys. More often than not it is either Esc or a function key.

What Features Does The BIOS Control?

Below is a list of the main functions of the BIOS:

• Setting the clock
• Configuring the boot order
• Setting power controls
• Enabling and disabling of hardware
• Passwords

Setting The Clock

Why would you set the system clock when you can change it on the operating system? Well, where do you think the operating system gets some of its information? The omnipotent BIOS! Setting the clock should be an easy task. Just navigate to the proper screen, look at your wall clock and set it. Presto!

Boot Order

Setting up the boot order allows you to change what devices the system will look to boot from. Some options include:

• CD/DVD drive
• Hard Drive
• USB
• Network

Since you have not installed an operating system on to the hard drive you will want to make sure the first entry is the CD/DVD drive. Otherwise you will get an error when you boot up the system, since no operating system has been installed.

I recommend you change these settings once the operating system has been installed, otherwise anyone with an install disc can overwrite your operating system and everything on it. But for now, make sure the first boot option is your CD/DVD drive.

Power Management Controls

On the Power Management screen (often called APM or ACPI) you can set certain "Power On" scenarios. If you want the system to "Wake" (i.e turn back on) when a USB device is in use, you would want to set the "Power On By USB Device" to Enabled/On.

There are a few other power options you can set. you should consult your manual to get a better understanding of the options available for your particular BIOS. Most desktop configurations usually have the USB and the PS/2 options set to enabled. This will allow the system to "Wake" when the keyboard or mouse is used.

If your BIOS allows you to set the "ACPI 2.0" setting, you should set it to "Enabled" or "On". This will allow the operating system to access more power features.

Hardware Settings

On the hardware settings screen, you can change certain options when dealing with any on-board hardware (sound, video, network card(s)) or any connected components (PCI/AGP/PCI-E cards). So why would you want to do this? Simple, why force the operating system to "see" hardware that isn't there.

Say for example your motherboard has a floppy disc controller (ya, floppies are still around), but you don't have one installed. When you load the operating system, it will "see" the floppy controller and apply the correct drivers to use it. So the operating system is loading software for something for something you are not using. By disabling it in the BIOS you prevent the operating system from "seeing" this hardware, thereby saving you precious system resources.

Granted, having one extra driver is not going to slow your system down that much, but if you disable three or four of the options, you free up more system resources. Why would you want to knowingly slowdown your computer?

SATA Configuration

Since SATA drives are new to the block, they have a few backward-compatible options you can set. In the BIOS, if you navigate to your SATA device you may have the option to set its "mode". The mode can either be IDE, ACHI or RAID. The IDE setting makes your SATA device act as if it is a older (almost legacy) device. If you are running a newer version of Linux (2.6.x kernel) you can set it to its native ACHI setting.

The RAID setting is if you have multiple drives and you want to "Strip" and/or "Mirror" the data over these drives. RAID is used to provide a backup to any failed disks. For the average user, RAID may be more complicated to implement and is out of this articles main scope. If you have multiple hard drives and would like to implement this, Google a RAID tutorial to help you.

BIOS Security

There are typically two passwords you can set in the BIOS, a administrator/supervisor password and a boot password.

The administrator password, once set, requires any user trying to access the BIOS to type the password to gain access to the BIOS. The boot password, once set, requires a password to be entered EVERY time the system is booted.

At a minimum, you should set an administrator password on the BIOS. Doing this prevents people who have physical access to your computer to tamper with your settings. One example would be a user accessing the BIOS, changing the boot order and reinstalling another operating system.

NOTE: The BIOS password system is NOT fool-proof, any user that can open your computer case can easily locate the CMOS battery and remove it. Doing this forces the BIOS to return to its default settings. If you are security conscious you may want to purchase a case with a locking mechanism on it, to prevent this type of tampering.

Updating Your BIOS

In order to update your BIOS to the latest version, you need to do something called "flashing the BIOS".

NOTE: Take EXTREME care in doing this, if you do not follow your manual to the letter, you may damage your motherboard beyond repair, forcing you to buy and install a new one.

While over time, motherboard manufacturers have made it easier and more failure-tolerant, it is not wise to take this endeavor lightly. Each motherboard has it's own guidelines for updating it's BIOS and you should follow their instructions over this article.

The two major key points to make are: follow your manual closely and do not turn-off or reboot the system when you are "flashing" the BIOS.

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