BIOS Features
As we discussed earlier, the other big change to the AMD 690G chipset is the upgraded BIOS with improved overclocking features.
The first step to a successful overclock with AMD’s processors is to disable the AMD Cool n’ Quiet feature that automatically controllers the multiplier on the CPU.
The on-board graphics memory can be manually adjusted in the BIOS allowing up to a full gigabyte of memory to be assigned to it! Obviously that is completely overkill and AMD recommends 256MB for the best graphics and HD video playback performance.
This is the advanced chipset features menu that can still only be found by hitting Ctrl-F1 at the main BIOS screen. The organization of the overclocking options is well done and starts to resemble the NVIDIA 600 series’ somewhat.
The memory configuration screen provides all the timing adjustments and memory speeds available.
The memory speed can be changed here from DDR2-400 to DDR2-800 by adjusting the internal CPU memory multiplier.
CAS latency settings can be assigned here from 3ns up to 6ns.
This page in the BIOS has the settings for the PCIe graphics including here where we can force the x16 PCIe slot into any bandwidth mode you wish.
Here we can actually adjust the frequency of the internal GFX core up to 500 MHz, a 25% change from stock speeds.
Getting into the CPU overclocking settings, you can adjust the CPU multiplier from 6x up to the maximum the processor allows.
The internal bus speed on the AM2 processors can be adjust from 200 MHz up to 500 MHz — well beyond where most users are going to be taking their CPUs.
Finally, here you can see the basic power, voltage and temperature monitoring functions the Gigabyte MA69GM-S2H offers.
Update 8/15/07: Another BIOS update has come from Gigabyte after this review that offers some voltage adjustments as well as the overclocking options listed here.
