So ..I thought I'd start yet another build using my ASUS industrial ? P5A motherboard.
But of course ..I would like to have the most recent Bios I can find in it.
This is the first time I have even tried to use the mobo.
According to award flash :-
Currently is using
Bios REV 1007.A (7/16/99)
Is anyone aware of anything more recent ? expermental or otherwise I can try ?
rgds
VS
It appears you have the latest non-beta BIOS. You can get the latest beta BIOS (not guaranteed to work perfectly) from ASUS themselves: https://www.asus.com/supportonly/P5A/HelpDesk_BIOS/
wrote:It appears you have the latest non-beta BIOS. You can get the latest beta BIOS (not guaranteed to work perfectly) from ASUS themselves: https://www.asus.com/supportonly/P5A/HelpDesk_BIOS/
Hmm ...just grabbed a copy but not sure if it would work.
award flash would be expecting a .BIN file ..and curiously the beta bios file is labelled 1011.005
I guess I could just rename it to 1011.BIN
but if it isn't the correct thing to do could brick the P5A.
A curious way to name a bios update imo
rgds
VS
So far so good ..
Took a chance ..backed up my bios and reflashed with the 1011.005 without changing the file extension...and held my breath..
It appears to have worked as I'm now in the bios to reset defaults as recommeded by A-flash
rgds
VS
Not tried anything bigger as yet ..but the bios now sees a 40gb IDE drive ..where previously it did not.
it's a start.
Now at the RAM stage ..
Got hold of the manual ..and it would appear I can populate up to 768mb ...using PC-100 (presumably 3 x 256mb sticks)
I would like this to use 512mb (optimal max for win98)
..of course I dont have 256mb sticks of PC-100.
I was surprised by this as I do have a lot of ram in my collection..but I guess this wasn't that common at the time...at least for home use.
I do have PC133 256mb strips..and these physically fit in the dimm slots.
I'm curious ? would these function without problems ?
The P5A would not have been designed with these in mind at the time..so might cause complications particularly with a beta bios installed.
Any advice from you guys would be much appreciated.
rgds
VS
What I have read is that my recently aquired AMD-K6-III/450 is natively supported so it might well end up in this build.
🤣
Any PC133 stick should work just fine in a PC100-compatible system, and with tighter timings to boot.
Your sticks are rated faster than what's required. As long as the chips are compatible with the motherboard and in the right organisation they should work. You also have the on die L2 cache so caching limitations do not apply. 😀
My recommendation is to just try it out. You won't break anything by using larger sticks. 😉
Though nothing that runs well on any K6 actually needs more than 128MB RAM.
Thanks for the quick responses guys..
onwards and upwards.
rgds
VS