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Shuttle uses the standard Award v6.00PG BIOS with its familiar yellow on blue layout. Once again, all really interesting settings are found within the Advanced Chipset Features menu.

System Performance

As we described in detail in our review of the ASUS A7N8X, the system performance can be set to "Optimal", "Aggressive", "Turbo" and "Expert" mode where "Optimal" means that all parameters pertaining to memory and CPU interfacing are set automatically or by SPD with the exception of the FSB frequency. Aggressive forces synchronous memory frequency with the shortest latencies supported by the DRAM except for CAS latency that is set by SPD. Turbo overrides all latency settings and specifies 2:2:2 latency settings. All three mentioned settings only allow 100 / 133 / 166 MHz FSB settings.

The real fun starts when "Expert" is selected since this setting frees up all FSB settings from 100 to 200 MHz in 1MHz steps and also allows manual setting of the memory frequency and all latencies. To make a long story short, some of the settings don't make sense but those are the same issues we already went over in the ASUS A7N8X review. Examples are tRAS values from 1-15T (usable range is really 5-7T) as well as a tRCD and tRP range from 1T to 7T (2-4T are usable)

An adaptation to the integrated graphics is the setting of the frame buffer size from 8MB to 128MB and the different modes of TV-support for NTSC and PAL.

Keep in mind that there are no provisions for increasing any of the voltages, that is, both CPU and memory voltages are locked at their nominal values. The board supports DDR400 or PC3200, VDD and VDDQ are both at 2.6V and we had no problems running the SN41G2 at 200 MHz using 2 x 256 MB Mushkin PC3200 memory and an unlocked XP2400+ (L3-5 closed).

That does not mean that the SN41G2 is the optimal toy for overclocking, the one critical parameter missing is the multiplier setting for the CPU. In addition, we had no luck getting the XP2800+ to run at default speed on the SN41G2. With the last L3 bridge closed, the system would work, albeit at a 7x multiplier. Similarly, the XP-2400 would come up at 6x which was fine in order to run the system at 1200 MHz (6x200 MHz) but not get us anywhere near the potential of the processor.

The FSB / Clear CMOS Bug

Related to this is another small bug that caused us some severe headaches. For some reason, if the system is overclocked via changing the FSB to a point where the CPU will no longer initialize, it will not help to clear the CMOS. That is, the FSB will be locked at the impossible setting and prevent any further attempts to initialize the board. Removing the battery will not help either. However, the workaround is as simple as holding down the insert key during a cold boot to cause the system to default back to the safest settings, that is a 100 MHz FSB using the "optimal" setting which can still cause some problem if e.g. PC3200 memory is used that requires more than 2.6V.

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