BIOS Setup

Asus mainboards use seriously revised AMI BIOS code. Its unique interface is totally recognizable and has a few peculiar traits about it. However, the BIOS of Asus Rampage Gene II mainboard has been modified even more, for example, compared against the BIOS of Asus P6T mainboard and these differences stand out right away. For instance, instead of the traditional “Main” section with a number of not very interesting parameters that you barely ever change, we first see “Extreme Tweaker” section containing almost all options for maximum system performance optimizations.

Asus mainboards have long had a special section with all overclocking-related settings, but it is for the first time that it is the very first one on the list. It is an absolutely correct decision that some mainboard makers made long time ago. It sets a highly positive mood for the entire system configuring experience right from the start. Although it was almost immediately that we noticed almost the only existing issue. The first two parameters are of purely informational value and report the expected clock speeds for the CPU and the memory. When we don’t change anything and the system works in its nominal mode, the board always reports memory frequency being 1333 MHz; although in reality the memory works at 1067 MHz, just like on other mainboards.

“Tuning Mode” parameter is intended for self-restriction. When it is set to “Extreme OC”, we can access all the available settings, while in “Gaming” mode we can work with a considerably shorter list of parameters. “CPU Level Up” and “Memory Level Up” parameters will be of great help to commencing overclockers who would like to “play” the overclocking game. Yes, to play, because these overclocking algorithms are far from being perfect. For example, you can overclock your CPU to its maximum in automatic mode by setting the “CPU Level Up” parameter to “i7-965-3.20G”. In this case the CPU clock frequency will increase to 3.2 GHz after the corresponding increase in the base clock, but the memory frequency will remain fairly low.

To achieve these results, some of the voltages will also be automatically increased:

Things get even trickier, when “Memory Level Up” parameter kicks in. you may think that all you need to do in this case is simply increase the memory frequency, but the board will in fact perform a much more complicated succession of actions. For example, by choosing “DDR3-1800MHz” setting, you will increase the base frequency and raise the memory speed to 1800 MHz at the same time. To make sure that the CPU frequency will remain as close to its nominal value as possible in this case, its clock multiplier will be lowered.

This is when all necessary voltages are again adjusted automatically. The memory voltage will also go up, although the board doesn’t show it in any way.

I don’t know how many Asus mainboard owners use these overclocking tools, but I think the commencing overclockers should realize how imperfect they are. That is why we will set “Ai Overclock Tuner” parameter to Manual to ensure correct and efficient overclocking experience later on.

Moreover, “Ai Overclock Tuner” parameter may be also set to “X.M.P.”. In this case the mainboard will on its own change the memory frequency and timings and increase the corresponding voltages, so that the resulting settings could correspond to the ones recorded in one of the two memory SPD profiles. By setting “Ai Overclock Tuner” parameter to “ROG Memory Profile” we can choose one of the three profiles: Speedy, Flying or Lightning. This is when the mainboard will use more and more aggressive timings for the selected memory frequency. In this case I was a little upset that all “Ai Overclock Tuner” settings are mutually exclusive. We either set it to “Manual”, or choose ”ROG Memory Profile”. I think they could have made “ROG Memory Profile” an individual parameter, so that it could be possible to improve the memory timings automatically during manual CPU and memory overclocking.

Next we see another pleasant surprise. The “CPU Configuration” sub-section with all settings related to processor technologies has finally been moved into “Extreme Tweaker” section. Although, as we will see later on, it hasn’t been removed from the “Advanced” section and is duplicated there. It must have been done for those not attentive enough. :)

We are not going to comment on a number of obvious settings in the “Extreme Tweaker” section including “DRAM Frequency” that will allow setting the desired memory frequency, “UCLK Frequency” that will automatically adjust the UnCore frequency accordingly, “QPI Link Data Rate” that will allow adjusting the QPI bus frequency.

“DRAM Timing Control” parameter leads you to a page with numerous memory timings that can be adjusted on Asus Rampage II Gene mainboard. It is very convenient to have those special info lines displaying the current timings settings and to be able to adjust all parameters independently. What I mean is that changing only one setting won’t require you to adjust all the others as well, they will remain automatically set. Although it could have been much more convenient if the current memory timings were displayed not as a line but in a separate column on the right-hand side – each opposite to the corresponding parameter.

We have finally reached “Extreme Tweaker” section with the group of parameters for voltage control. At first we were very pleased to see “EPU II Phase Control” parameter there. Asus mainboards were among the first to change the number of active phases in the processor voltage regulator circuitry depending on the current load level. However, before they could only control the energy-saving modes on the software level using Asus EPU-6 Engine utility. Now you can select the desired mode right in the BIOS. Unfortunately, we didn’t notice any significant changes in the mainboard’s power consumption after changing “EPU II Phase Control” parameter.

“Extreme OV” parameter, just like “Tuning Mode” parameter in the beginning of the section is required for additional protection. It sets limitations in the voltage adjustment intervals. For example, if you enable it, you will be able to send an extremely high voltage of 2.5 W to the CPU. If “Extreme OV” parameter is disabled, the Vcore is limited with 1.8 W max, which is actually also quite high.