BIOS and Overclocking

The reviewed mainboard is supposed to have good overclocking options. That’s why this section is the longest in our today’s review. The BIOS comes first. We are most interested in “SoftMenu III” and “Advanced Chipset Features Setup” pages, as they hide the most important parameters.

Here we have CPU and voltages settings. You can see in the snapshot that we are allowed to adjust the CPU multiplier, FSB frequency, and the FSB/memory frequencies ratio. NVIDIA nForce2 allows setting this parameter in a wide range, although the highest performance is reached in the synchronous mode, when the FSB frequency equals the memory frequency. The upper limit of the FSB frequency is 237MHz in this mainboard, which is rather ordinary according to today’s standards. It’s another thing that not all mainboards can work at the maximum allowable FSB clock-rate. We may take Gigabyte 667 Ultra mainboards for Pentium 4. They allow setting 355MHz FSB, but have a rather average overclocking potential. We will learn a bit later whether ABIT NF7-S stands to its word and works at the specified FSB. Now we go to the “SoftMenu III” page.

The CPU multiplier can be changed from 5 to 22. Looks impressive, although hardly useful. The next parameter, “CPU Interface”, is of rather questionable use. When it is “Disabled” the board will use ”the most stable CPU/FSB settings will be used” (as it said in the user manual).

The AGP frequency can be adjusted independently of the FSB and memory clock-rates. Rather a useful thing: you don’t have to worry about the graphics card during overclocking.

The next section of the “SoftMenu III” page lists the voltages. The CPU voltage can be set from 1.1V to 1.85V with 0.025V stepping. We can’t say it is gigantic as some mainboards can increase the CPU voltage to 2.2V, but 1.85V is quite enough in most cases. ABIT may have thought that higher voltage would have been dangerous. We share this point of view, although extreme overclockers may remain unsatisfied.

There is one peculiarity we found in NF7-S concerning the CPU voltage. According to hardware monitoring data, the voltage CPU actually receives is about 0.05V lower than set in the mainboard BIOS. We can’t say why it is so, especially as the mainboard is equipped with a quality voltage regulator. If there is some problem in the BIOS, it may be corrected in the future. So far, the maximum voltage you can actually send to the CPU in NF7-S is 1.8V. By the way, lower voltages may also come in handy: to reduce CPU heat dissipation and to build “noiseless” systems.

The next parameter, memory voltage, can vary from 2.4V to 2.7V with 0.1V stepping. The second limit looks rather low. Some companies that produce overclocking memory modules (for example, Corsair) recommend setting memory voltage to 2.8V for highest performance. And once again, there is some inconsistency between the value in the BIOS and the actual voltage, which is about 0.02V higher.

The next option is “Chipset Voltage”. There are three available values: 1.5V, 1.6V and 1.7V. By increasing the chipset voltage, you can achieve higher working stability at high FSB frequencies. Interestingly, the chipset voltage in ABIT NF7-S is raised beforehand. It’s 1.6V against the regular 1.5V. So, the active cooler mounted onto the North Bridge seems quite appropriate in this case.

The AGP voltage can vary from 1.5V (nominal) to 1.8V with 0.1V stepping (for AGP 4x graphics cards). It’s not a very helpful option as doesn’t make sense to overclock the graphics card by setting higher AGP frequency and voltage. Anyway, this option doesn’t harm the performance or stability, either, so why not have it?

The last parameter in the “SoftMenu III” page is called “CPU Over Temp. Protect”. A similar item is available in the “PC Health Status” menu. Moreover, the temperature values shown in these two pages of the BIOS may differ and we can’t tell which has a higher priority. And the both items, according to their descriptions, serve to set the highest CPU temperature value. When the CPU temp is over it, the system shuts down to protect the processor from overheating.