BIOS Setup

The BIOS of DFI LANParty LT X38-T2R mainboard is based on Phoenix-Award micro-code. It can be reflashed upon boot-up using a traditional floppy disk or from Windows with Winflash utility version 192 (the most current).

The options available in the first sections are pretty standard. The only thing we were pretty surprised with was the absence of an option to disable the IEEE1394 controller. Not that it is a very frequently used option, but why not disable this controller if it is not needed? Finally, if it is really hard to do in the BIOS, they could have added one more jumper to the board. However, we were very pleased to see that DFI joined those mainboard makers who enable USB keyboard and mouse support by default.

The first BIOS section that we should definitely dwell on is PC Health Status. At first glance it looks quite OK, though unfortunately we can control the rotation speed of only three fans out of six that can be connected to the board. Besides, fan rotation speed adjustment will not work if the fan uses a three-pin connector.

The CPU temperature according to DFI LANParty LT X38-T2R mainboard is reported as being too low. In fact, you can correct the reported parameters with the help of DFI’s unique Adjust CPU Temp option. However, how much higher should we set the CPU temperature reporting data if the difference with CoreTemp numbers in idle mode is over 20ºC (!) and in burn mode less than 10ºC? This makes us doubt the correctness of other monitoring data reported by the board.

No other mainboard out there can compete with Genie BIOS Setting section of DFI LANParty LT X38-T2R. The list of parameters that can be adjusted is impressively long:

The mainboard allows adjusting the processor clock frequency multiplier and FSB frequency from 200MHz to 700MHz, and the Target CPU Clock information string will immediately report the resulting CPU frequency. The memory frequency adjustment is also organized in the same convenient way. We select the desired FSB:Mem ratio from the list and Target DRAM Speed will report the resulting frequency.

The list of available dividers is quite extensive. Besides the ones you see on the screenshot above there are also 400/800 and 400/1066.

The parameters related to processor, memory and voltages are singled out in individual sub-sections. The simplest and most common-looking one is the CPU Feature section that doesn’t reveal any surprises:

However when we get into the next section called DRAM Timing, the list of available parameters can no longer fit into a single screen: