BIOS
The features provided by the chipset and additional onboard controllers is just a part of the deal. You have to be able to take advantage of these features and the options offered by the mainboard BIOS are very important in determining the final verdict about the product.
The BIOS of the DFI LanParty UT NF590 SLI-M2R/G mainboard is based on Award code, looks pretty common and offers a standard set of options. There are only two new sections there: Genie BIOS Setting and CMOS Reloaded. Let?s start with the first one:
In the Genie BIOS Settings page you can find almost all the settings dealing with the operation of the mainboard, CPU and memory that can ever be of interest to an overclocker. Here you can change the frequency and width of busses between the CPU and the chipset, as well as SPP and MCP. The processor clock frequency multiplier can be reduced below the nominal 4x with 0.5 increment, and the clock generator frequency can be adjusted between 100 and 500MHz with the unusual 2MHz increment. Moreover, you can also see the current voltage of the CPU, HyperTransport bus, South Bridge and memory.
From the Genie BIOS Settings there are links to individual pages with PCI-devices settings, voltages adjustments and memory operating parameters.
- The processor Vcore can be adjusted between 1.0V and 1.6V with a very small increment of 0.00625V;
- Vid Special parameter can be changed from 100 to 121.25% with 0.1% increment;
- NB Core: between 1.2V and 1.5V with 0.02V increment;
- SB Core: between 1.5V and 1.8V with 0.02V increment;
- SB StandBy: between 1.5V and 1.8V with 0.1V increment;
- CPU/C51 HT: between 1.3V and 1.5V with variable increment of 0.01V-0.02V;
- C51/MCP55 HT: between 1.3V and 1.5V with 0.01V increment;
- DRAM voltage: between 1.7V and 3.0V with 0.02V increment;
Nvidia chipsets have already made us used to a diverse variety of memory settings that can be adjusted , and nForce 590 SLI is no exception here:
The BIOS of DFI LanParty UT NF590 SLI-M2R/G mainboard shows the current status of the memory parameters allowing to adjust only selected ones, leaving all other settings at default, which is very convenient.
The PC Health Status page is also pretty interesting, as it allows controlling system temperatures and voltages and adjusting the system fans according to the temperatures.
As for the CMOS Reloaded section, it will be extremely useful for overclockers and hardware enthusiasts ready to experiment. After each successful system restart, the BIOS settings are automatically saved. If some settings were adjusted incorrectly, the system will load the previous saved settings on restart. Moreover, there are four user banks where you can save your BIOS presets for different work modes. Each can be assigned a detailed description and loaded by hitting a selected hot key on system boot-up without even accessing the BIOS Setup.
