[. . . ] IN NO EVENT SHALL ASUS, ITS DIRECTORS, OFFICERS, EMPLOYEES OR AGENTS BE LIABLE FOR ANY INDIRECT, SPECIAL, INCIDENTAL, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES (INCLUDING DAMAGES FOR LOSS OF PROFITS, LOSS OF BUSINESS, LOSS OF USE OR DATA, INTERRUPTION OF BUSINESS AND THE LIKE), EVEN IF ASUS HAS BEEN ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES ARISING FROM ANY DEFECT OR ERROR IN THIS MANUAL OR PRODUCT. S P E C I F I C AT I O N S A N D I N F O R M AT I O N C O N TA I N E D I N T H I S MANUAL ARE FURNISHED FOR INFORMATIONAL USE ONLY, AND ARE SUBJECT TO CHANGE AT ANY TIME WITHOUT NOTICE, AND SHOULD NOT BE CONSTRUED AS A COMMITMENT BY ASUS. ASUS ASSUMES NO RESPONSIBILITY OR LIABILITY FOR ANY ERRORS OR INACCURACIES THAT MAY APPEAR IN THIS MANUAL, INCLUDING THE PRODUCTS AND SOFTWARE DESCRIBED IN IT. Products and corporate names appearing in this manual may or may not be registered trademarks or copyrights of their respective companies, and are used only for identification or explanation and to the owners benefit, without intent to infringe. ii Contents Notice . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . [. . . ] Insert a floppy disk that contains the original or the latest BIOS file for this motherboard. If all the necessary files are found in the floppy disk, the BIOS update process continues. Make sure that the BIOS file in the floppy disk is renamed as "M5A87. ROM". 2-6 Chapter 2: BIOS Setup Bad BIOS checksum. When the BIOS update process is complete, reboot the system. To recover the BIOS from the support CD: 1. When a corrupted BIOS is detected, the following screen message appears. Bad BIOS checksum. If there is no floppy disk found in the drive, the system automatically checks the CD-ROM. 3. The support CD contains the a working BIOS for this motherboard. Bad BIOS checksum. When the BIOS update process is complete, reboot the system. The recovered BIOS may not be the latest BIOS version for this motherboard. Visit ASUS website (www. asus. com) to download the latest BIOS file. ASUS M5A87 Motherboard 2-7 2. 2 BIOS Setup Program This motherboard supports a programmable firmware chip that you can update using the provided utility described in section "2. 1 Managing and updating your BIOS. " Use the BIOS Setup program when you are installing a motherboard, reconfiguring your system, or prompted to "Run Setup". This section explains how to configure your system using this utility. Even if you are not prompted to use the Setup program, you may want to change the configuration of your computer in the future. For example, you may want to enable the security password feature or change the power management settings. Setting to Auto allows automatic selection of the appropriate IDE device type. Select ARMD (ATAPI Removable Media Device) if your device is either a ZIP, LS-120, or MO drive. Configuration options: [Not Installed] [Auto] [CDROM] [ARMD] LBA/Large Mode [Auto] Enables or disables the LBA mode. Setting to Auto enables the LBA mode if the device supports this mode, and if the device was not previously formatted with LBA mode disabled. Configuration options: [Disabled] [Auto] Block (Multi-sector Transfer) [Auto] Enables or disables data multi-sectors transfers. When set to Auto, the data transfer from and to the device occurs multiple sectors at a time if the device supports multi-sector transfer feature. When set to Disabled, 2-12 Chapter 2: BIOS Setup the data transfer from and to the device occurs one sector at a time. Configuration options: [Auto] [0] [1] [2] [3] [4]. PIO Mode [Auto] Selects the DMA mode. Configuration options: [Auto] [SWDMA0] [SWDMA1] [SWDMA2] [MWDMA0] [MWDMA1] [MWDMA2] [UDMA0] [UDMA1] [UDMA2] [UDMA3] [UDMA4] [UDMA5] [UDMA6]. DMA Mode [Auto] Sets the Smart Monitoring, Analysis, and Reporting Technology. Configuration options: [Auto] [Disabled] [Enabled]. SMART Monitoring [Auto] Enables or disables 32-bit data transfer. Configuration options: [Disabled] [Enabled] 32Bit Data Transfer [Disabled] 2. 3. 5 System Information This menu gives you an overview of the general system specifications. [. . . ] Refer to section "3. 4 Creating a RAID driver disk" for details. 3. 3. 1 Installing hard disks The motherboard supports Serial ATA hard disk drives. For optimal performance, install identical drives of the same model and capacity when creating a disk array. Installing SATA hard disks To install the SATA hard disks for RAID configuration: 1. Connect the SATA power cable to the power connector on each drive. ASUS M5A87 Motherboard 3-7 3. 4 Creating a RAID Driver Disk To create a RAID driver disk: 1. Insert the motherboard support CD into the CD-ROM drive and locate the Makedisk. exe utility for your RAID controller. [. . . ]