Eclipse SLI BIOS, Software, And Accessories
MSI Eclipse BIOS ranges are more than adequate for extracting the ultimate performance from most components, but the company’s use of plus and minus volts, rather than resulting values, is a little awkward.
| BIOS Frequency and Voltage Settings | |
|---|---|
| CPU Reference Clock | 133 to 400 MHz (1 MHz) |
| Clock Multiplier Adjustment | Yes |
| DRAM Ratios | DDR3-800 to DDR3-2133 |
| PCIe Clock | 100 to 200 MHz (1 MHz) |
| CPU Vcore | Stock -0.32 to +0.63 volts (0.010 volts) |
| QPI/VTT (uncore) Voltage | Stock -0.32 to +0.63 volts (0.010 volts) |
| IOH (Northbridge) Vcore | 0.78 to 1.73 volts (0.010 volts) |
| ICH (Southbridge) Vcore | 0.70 to 2.13 volts (0.010 volts) |
| DRAM Voltage | 1.20 to 2.77 volts (0.010 volts) |
| CAS Latency Range | tCAS:6-11; tRCD: 3-15; tRP: 3-15; tRAS: 9-31 |
MSI bests several competitors by including clock skew controls in addition to VREF, voltage, memory timing, and clock speed settings. XMP Profile settings appeared ineffective, so users should instead set memory speed, timings, and voltage manually.
The menus do get somewhat unwieldy, with a few “detected value” pages that have no settings.
The Eclipse SLI includes four BIOS profile registers, allowing for a variety of configurations to be saved for later use.
MSI OverclockingCenter and GreenPowerCenter provide several clock and voltage controls. Manual selections worked for us, but selecting any of MSI’s pre-defined profiles caused our system to lock up.
Accessories
| Accessories | |
|---|---|
| Documentation and Software | Quick Installation Guide |
| Motherboard Manual | |
| Motherboard Facts Sheet | |
| Audio Card Manual | |
| HDD Backup Guide | |
| Driver CD (Windows Vista) | |
| Driver CD (Windows XP) | |
| Sound Card DVD | |
| MSI HDD Backup DVD | |
| Hardware | 1 x Quick Connector Kit |
| 3 x 4-pin to SATA Power Adapter | |
| 6 x SATA Data Cable | |
| 1 x X-Fi Xtreme Audio PCIe Card | |
| 1 x 80-conductor Ultra ATA Cable | |
| 1 x Floppy Cable | |
| 1 x SATA to eSATA Breakout Plate (2 ports) | |
| 1 x USB 2.0 Breakout Plate (2 ports) | |
| 1 x eSATA to SATA Data Cable | |
| 1 x 4-pin to SATA Power Adapter (External) | |
| 1 x GreenPower Genie power monitor | |
| 1 x Power Monitor Connector Cable | |
| 1 x D-LED2 System Status Display | |
| 1 x D-LED2 Thermal Probe | |
| 1 x GreenPower Genie data cable | |
| 1 x I/O Panel Shield | |
| 2 x CrossFire Bridge | |
| 1 x SLI Bridge |
MSI packs its Eclipse SLI box with accessories, but some are more useful than others. We found the GreenPower Genie adapter particularly questionable since it adds resistance to the circuit through several added connectors and appears to monitor only the 24-pin connection.
