Tips And Comments
Recommended BIOS Timing Settings for the Different Bus Speeds
a) 50, 55 and 60 MHz Bus Speed
If you should be running this board at these bus speeds (which I consider as pretty sad), you can max out the BIOS timing settings totally:
| Auto Configuration | Disabled |
| DRAM Read Burst Timing | x222 |
| DRAM Write Burst Timing | x222 |
| RAS to CAS Delay | 2T |
| DRAM R/W Leadoff Timing | 6T/5T |
| DRAM Turbo Read Leadoff | Enabled |
| DRAM Speculative Leadoff | Enabled |
| Turn-Around Insertion | Disabled |
| Turbo Read Pipelining | Enabled |
b) 66 MHz Bus Speed
I've been able to run Quake at this Bus Speed completely without any change to the above, however the below configuration is the safe configuration for Windows 95. You anyway won't notice any performance difference even in Quake, with Turbo Read Leadoff disabled or enabled.
| Auto Configuration | Disabled |
| DRAM Read Burst Timing | x222 |
| DRAM Write Burst Timing | x222 |
| RAS to CAS Delay | 2T |
| DRAM R/W Leadoff Timing | 6T/5T |
| DRAM Turbo Read Leadoff | Disabled |
| DRAM Speculative Leadoff | Enabled |
| Turn-Around Insertion | Disabled |
| Turbo Read Pipelining | Enabled |
c) 75 MHz Bus Speed
This again is the Windows 95 save setting. You might howeverhave to change the Leadoff Timing to 7T/6T instead, in caseyou're occuring crashes or lockups in Windows 95. Another causefor trouble could be your EIDE interface. If you can't get ridoff strange lockups, try to change your PIO mode settings to 3instead of Auto. This btw won't make your HDD any slower at all,so don't worry.
| Auto Configuration | Disabled |
| DRAM Read Burst Timing | x222 |
| DRAM Write Burst Timing | x222 |
| RAS to CAS Delay | 2T |
| DRAM R/W Leadoff Timing | 6T/5T |
| DRAM Turbo Read Leadoff | Disabled |
| DRAM Speculative Leadoff | Enabled |
| Turn-Around Insertion | Disabled |
| Turbo Read Pipelining | Disabled |
d) 83 MHz Bus Speed
I've been fiddeling with these settings a whole lot and the automatic 60 ns DRAM setting is by far the safest, especially for Windows95. I would also like to note, that the displayed timing settings, which are chosen automatically, are actually NOT reflecting the real settings. The real settings must be quite a bit faster, because you get a much slower main memory speed, if you choose the very same settings manually. Additionally I had to change the PIO mode of my HDDs to Mode 3 or even Mode 2. A test run with Winbench 96 was still showing a Diskmark of 1250 though.
| Auto Configuration | 60ns DRAM |
| DRAM Read Burst Timing | x222 |
| DRAM Write Burst Timing | x333 |
| RAS to CAS Delay | 3T |
| DRAM R/W Leadoff Timing | 6T/5T |
| DRAM Turbo Read Leadoff | Disabled |
| DRAM Speculative Leadoff | Enabled |
| Turn-Around Insertion | Disabled |
| Turbo Read Pipelining | Disabled |
A Few Comments
The automatic '60ns DRAM' timing setting in the BIOS timing section of the setup is actually using different and faster settings than displayed!!
Overclocking seems to be somewhat more difficult than with my previous P/I-P55TP4XEG board. It has been tough, to get Windows 95 running stable at the 187.5 MHz CPU clock, I'm not really sure about the stability at o/c to 200 MHz and I've never been able to finish Winstone 96 at 208 MHz.
As you can see, there are a few bus speed jumper settings left, which can lead you to even more different bus speeds. One setting wouldn't let my system even boot, regardless of the multiplier setting. I would imagine, that this is the setting for a bus speed of 100 MHz.
Summary
First of all, as you all know, I have to name the ability to run this HX board at 75 and even 83 MHz bus speed!! It makes this board to a one of a kind and it will be the reason for the huge success, this board will earn. It's funny enough, because it's actually no big deal, to supply a motherboard with a timer chip, that can produce all these bus speeds. I don't think, that Asus is having any more procuction costs due to this timer chip. It only shows, that at last one motherboard manufacturer either has had the guts to stand up against Intel, who certainly dislike this new bus speed ability, or that Asus is the first company to see, how much we users out here are into tuning of our hardware. Which ever reason has been leading Asus' decision for the higher multiplier settings, we have to thank Asus to give us the ability to reach new performance heights due to these new settings. It won't be of any damage to Asus, that much is sure. I'm certain that either already now, or within a short while, this board will be the best seller of all Pentium boards. We can only hope, that the other motherboard manufacturers, who are enviously looking at this page, have got the message by now. I'd like to name Tyan and Supermicro in particular. These two successful motherboard manufacturers have been pathetic enough, to leave us dumb and unable to achieve any bus speeds above 66 MHz on their boards. Maybe only to please Intel. The ones, who HAVE to be pleased however are we, the stupid little computer users and customers. As soon as the sales go down for Tyan and Supermicro, they will learn, that taking us for brain dead is not the right way to go. I wonder, how long it will take, until Tyan and Supermicro will produce motherboards with 75 and 83 MHz bus speed too. Maybe they even will have the guts, to supply me with some of their motherboards for testing then.
I am recommending this motherboard without any restrictions. I am running my system at 166/83 now for a week and it is rock solid. As long as you adjust the RAM timing to sensible values, you won't have any problems with it. I am missing more than 4 SIMM slots though, because so far I only could get 45ns EDO in 8 MB SIMMs, which leaves me without any expansion space for my RAM. Other than that I'm entirely satisfied with this board and it will stay in my system until a considerably faster board should come out, that is as reliable as this Asus motherboard.
I would again like to stress, that the ATX version of this board P/I-XP55T2P4 does NOT support any bus speed higher than 66 MHz, and the upcoming revision 3 of this board doesn't either. To my knowledge the VX chipset board P/I-P55TVX4 only supports up to 75 MHz bus speed.
Finally a little side note for you. I've recently heard the rumor, that Intel is planning a Pentium Classic at 225 and 250 MHz. Doesn't this sound familiar? Maybe I've been spoiling the surprise, Intel wanted to offer us by releasing a P225 and P250 and announcing the birth of 75 and 83 MHz bus speed. Maybe this is the reason, why the P/I-P55T2P4 is supporting these bus speeds already. ?????? Well, but it is only a rumor.... ;-).
Related Links
ASUS Home WWW Server, frame free version
ASUS P/I-P55T2P4 Specification
ASUS FTP Server
ASUS FTP BIOS Site
ASUS FTP BIOS Beta versions , only for fearless cracks
