Technical Document + Attachments _____Intel and all Disti_ _______________________________________________________ Document Information Title: BIOS version 1.00.10.AX1 for Premiere/PCI II - "Mambo" BIOS Date Written: 09/01/94 Rev #: 1.0 Customer Distribution: Public Information - Post on FaxBack*/BBS Type: Support Tools Archive Date: 09/01/96 Support Tool Type: Bios Systems and Branded Products Prod Family: Desktop Boards and Systems Systems and Branded Products Base Products: Premiere/PCI II Document Contact: Geography Contact DocID: BKA9QG Abstract About This Release (Phase II "Mambo" Plug and Play BIOS) o BIOS 1.00.10.AX1 Release 10.0 -Plato. o Releases 7,8,9 were on an old data base and not phase II. Attached document lists features/errata fixed in this release and new features included. Flash BIOS upgrade file also attched in self-extracting zipped file. _______________________________________________________________________ Attached Files: 10010AX1.EXE (259891) File Type: Other , Zip Paper Size: None Total Bytes: 276,970 _______________________________________________________________________ Document Details: Features/Errata Fixed In This Release Release 10.0 o Fixed APM bug in which system would not power down if no mouse attached.. o APM fix for drives that handle the IDLE IMMEDIATE command incorrectly. Problem seen as short power down cycle. o APM fix to intelligently add IRQ 14, 15 to system event list. Problem seen by powering down drives during format if drive on PCI bus. o Fixed hang condition with power mangament and POWER.EXE. o Fixed problem where APM could hang on certain video BIOSs. o A20 is disabled before booting. o Changed TIMER0 from MODE 2 to MDE 3. o Disabled interrupts for soft resets. o PCI to Memory posted write buffers disabled if PCMC A0 stepping detected. Problem seen mostly by SCSI drives not booting. o GAT mode turned off and removed from SETUP. o Disable IDE DMA due to chipset errata. o Disabled CPU to DRAM read around bit in PCMC(Reg 53 bit 3=0). Setting the bit caused network ABEND errors. o Fixed Setup hang condition for last entry on a page. o Fixed internal Setup pointers. o Palette snooping now tracks SETUP. o SETUP numeric and alpha fields dont require a and the F10 works. o Moved Pallete snooping & latency timer from the Plug and Play Configuration page to the Advanced Chipset Configuration page and removed the Supervisor control to be consistant with other features. o Internal Setup re-organization-not visibal to the user. o SETUP entries Unattended start and Security hot key entries only appear when a user password is valid. The Administrator password has no affect on the two entries. o Fixed no video or wrong gray shades when in SETUP with a monochrome monitor. o Removed obsolete code. o Fixed odd length password hang condition. o Fixed password problem where a valid boot password plus extra characters was recognized as a valid password. The hotkey password and unattended start remain as is for IBM keyboard controller compatability. o Fixed stack problem if password Unattended start enabled. o Fixed conflicts between on-board serial ports and off-board serial ports. o Fixed condition where SCSI drives could not boot. o Palette snooping disabled if Cirrus 5434 B-step detected. o Updated German translations. o ESC changed in French text to ECHAP. o Floppy controller error not displayed if CMOS indicates no floppy drive present. o Re-added INT 15 E801. Win NT 3.1 is limited to 64MB(no change from Beta 1.01). o Fixed the Manufacturing Default. This change was made on Hard drive timeout. This change does not have any impact on the shipping configuration. (Release 2.0) Beta 7.02 AX1 o Mouse not detected message deleted. Only the mouse detected message appears. o CPU powers down with APM enabled. o Both the APM and security hot keys work. o SETUP entry changed from ISA Video Linear Frame Buffer to ISA Linear Frame Buffer. o SETUP entries for ISA LFB Base Address fixed. o SETUP entries for ISA/PCI IRQs only appear if entries have not been taken by COM ports, LPT ports or mother board devices. o POST message System Halted after 3 invalid password entries changed to Invalid Password - System Halted. o Video hang with SCSI bug fixed. o False valid password generated by holding Spacebar down bug fixed. o INT 15h AX=E801 support removed. See note at end of document. o OS/2 hang with more than 64MB of memory bug fixed. o EMM386 bug of taking E000 page fixed by making PCI ESCD data block look like a PROM. o 2.88MB floppy format problem fixed. o NUM LOCK is set before SETUP entry. o NUM pad works in SETUP. o False indication of valid password fixed. Features Included In This Release Beta 7.02 o Keyboard LEDs cycle when unattended is invoked. o If no valid passwords then the Unattedned Start and Security hot key fields are removed from SETUP. Setup Changes Beta 7.01 o New, more friendly, user interface. Layered interface functions more like standard applications with better screen layout for easy viewing. Like functions are grouped onto screens or menus for easier configuration. o On-line help available for most setup fields. o Administrative password function allows all but Time/Date and User Password selections to be modified only by the system administrator. o New screen layout allows for more descriptive field text. o New screen layout permits field and option text to be translated without having to use cryptic abbreviations. Password Changes Beta 7.01 o Both User and Administrative passwords are available. o Passwords have been extended to seven(7) characters instead of the current six(6). Language Support Beta 7.01 o Multi-language support is now available. o OEMs and users will be able to flash language sets into the BIOS and configure which language is used through Setup. The current plas is for language pairs consisting of: English(US)/German(GR), English(US)/Italian(IT), English(US)/French(FR), and English(US)/Spanish(SP). o Depending upon the size of the FLASH device used for a particular product, up to 32 languages may be present at one time in the BIOS. Hard Disk Changes Beta 7.01 o User definable parameters are available on a per drive basis. This means each of the four drives may have unique user defined parameters. o The DMA selection (Auto-Configured or Disabled) may be set on a per drive basis. (The ability to select the DMA transfer mode has been removed.) o The Sector/Block selection (Auto-Configured, 8 Sectors/Block, 4 Sectors/Block, or Disabled) for multiple sector transfers may be set on a per drive basis. (The ability for finer resolution of Sector/Block size has been removed.) o The ability to disable fast PIO modes has been added. This selection (Auto-Configured or Disabled) may be set on a per drive basis. o The Translation selection (Auto-Configured, Logical Block Addressing, Extended Cylinder/Head/Sector or Standard Cylinder/Head/Sector) may be set on a per drive basis. o A Hard Disk Pre-Delay has been added to the Boot Options screen. This option sets a fixed amount of time to wait in POST before attempting to initialize any of the hard disks. This delay occurs only once before calling the hard disk initialization code. Because POST is so fast on this version of BIOS, many drives have not finished their power on self-test routines by the time the BIOS reaches its hard disk initialization code. For certain drives, if the BIOS attempts to query the drive before it has finished its self-test, the drive may hang. In an attempt to accommodate a user with one of these drives this option has been made available. (This option is available on some current products.) Chicago Plug and Play Beta 7.01 o Plug and Play version 1.2 will be supported in the Phase II BIOS. o Setup menus are still TBD. APM 1.1 Beta 7.01 o Advanced Power Management that supports both the APM 1.0 and 1.1 specifications. o Standby and Suspend are handled as like events allowing power down from OS/2 Control Panel. o Critical 1.1 calls are allowed even if the OS connects as 1.0. This allows POWER.EXE to run in 1.0 while a custom Windows driver takes advantage of full 1.1 compatibility. o Setup menus are still TBD. New Int 15h Extensions Beta 7.01 o New Int 15h Extensions for Extended Memory and Memory Map have been added. o Function E801 has been added to report the amount of contiguous memory above 1Mb. o Function E820 has been added to report a full memory map of the system. This function is used by Chicago and newer versions of Windows NT. Other Changes Beta 7.01 o A setup field has been added to enable/disable the Guaranteed Access Time (GAT) Mode for ISA Master and DMA devices. This feature may enhance the performance of ISA Master and DMA devices while degrading the performance of other non-ISA based devices. Disabling this feature may improve sound quality on some ISA based sound cards. o A setup field has been added to enable/disable Byte Merging on PCI. This feature enhances performance but may break some PCI graphics cards. Known Errata With This Release o None. Features Still To Be Added / Comments About This Release o None. Notes: Note 1: The various O/Ss either do their own memory detection or issue a series of BIOS interrupts to determine memory size. The most common series of BIOS interrupts are INT 12 to get base memory. Int 15 AH=88h is issued to get extended memory. Int 15h AX=E801h is issued to get memory above 64MB. NT-Daytona Beta 2 and Chicago issue Int 15h AX=E820. A problem occurs because there is no standard as to what Int 15h AH=88 returns. Microsoft expects up to 63MB UNLESS E801 is supported , when they expect only 15MB maximum. If Microsoft sees greater than 15MB they limit the memory to the AH=88 value and ignore the E801 results. Some O/Ss in the above situation limit memory to 16MB. Some O/Ss excpect Int 15 AH=88 to return up to 63MB and look at E801 for memory above 64MB. Eliminating the Int 15h AX-E801 support allows all O/S to handle up to 64MB using the Int 15h AH=88h. Those O/S that support Int 15h AX=E820h will handle memory above 64MB correctly. ___________ ____________________________________________________________________