ECS PF88 Extreme Mainboard

Enthusiasts are a fickle bunch of people, if you ask me. One minute they're swooning over the creamy, hard-to-elucidate quality that Intel brings to the table with its Hyper-Threading-equipped Pentium 4 processors. Next minute, the same enthusiasts are having performance pangs that only AMD's Athlon 64 S939 CPUs can satiate. That's why it's not uncommon for informed users to jump ship every so often, to really see if the grass is greener on the other side. The most fundamental question that a prospective PC purchaser needs to make, then, is which platform to go with. Once chosen, due to chipset and socket differences, you're stuck with a particular platform unless you take the drastic step of changing motherboards, which entails a long afternoon of hardware and software changes. Think about it, no other PC-related component is so much hassle, and changing back is just as much trouble. ATI and NVIDIA's graphics cards all share the same interfaces, so it's a simple matter of uninstalling drivers, popping in another card, and installing new drivers; a 10-minute job at best. Changing system memory is a cinch, and SATA hard drives can now be plugged, on-the-fly, into most modern board's ports. The ideal state of affairs would be the ability to run both Intel and AMD's CPUs on one board, with one operating system. Whilst technically feasible, ATX PCB considerations and the extra cost of paying for a socket that may or may not be used has always stopped the adventurous motherboard makers from having a go. ECS, however, has decided to throw away any pre-conceived mainboard design ideas by launching a single motherboard with the capacity to support most of today's top-end performance platforms, beginning with Intel's LGA775 and AMD's Socket-939. You'll be wondering how it's done. Read on to find out


Intel® SE440BX-2 Motherboard
Last Known Issues

Latest BIOS and drivers The BIOS identifier for the Intel® SE440BX-2 Motherboard is 4S4EB2X0.86A. The current BIOS version and current audio drivers for the Intel SE440BX-2 Motherboard are available. Intel SE440BX-2 Motherboard BIOS or audio drivers are not interchangeable with the Intel® SE440BX Motherboard (and vice versa). Intel SE440BX Motherboard or Intel SE440BX-2 MotherboardYou can identify your Intel motherboard by the Altered Assembly (AA) number or the BIOS version string.Click here for Processors supported by the Intel SE440BX-2 Motherboard.Click here for Memory configurations supported by the Intel SE440BX-2 Motherboard Secondary IDE change not workingThe retail version of Microsoft Windows* 95 may not recognize the Intel® 82371EB PIIX4e IDE controller used on Intel motherboards, causing the BIOS to disable the secondary IDE channel. This can result in IDE devices (such as CD-ROM drives) not being detected or disappearing after the system is rebooted. A utility is available to update the MSHDC.INF file and resolve the issue. Windows 95 also may fail to recognize a CD-ROM drive that does not comply with the ATAPI specification. PCI audio and IRQ issuesThe Intel SE440BX-2 Motherboard uses one PCI IRQ for audio to function with a PnP operating system such as Windows* 9x. One additional ISA IRQ is dedicated for legacy audio support. Legacy audio support is used for DOS-based applications and games that are SoundBlaster* compatible. Most DOS-based applications and games only use SoundBlaster-compatible legacy audio requiring the use of an ISA IRQ. By disabling the ISA legacy audio support in the operating system the dedicated ISA IRQ is freed, thus using only one PCI IRQ. DOS applications and games that require SoundBlaster audio support will have no audio output if ISA legacy audio is disabled. Note: PCI interrupts are shareable per PCI specification 2.0 and 2.1. IRQ9 not available to ISA add-in cardsIRQ9 is designated for the power management feature of the PIIX4E controller. IDE device not displayed during power-upAll IDE devices must be ATA4 compliant and the cable length is limited to 18 inches. IDE devices that are not selected as auto-detect in the BIOS setup are not displayed as part of the Power On Self Test (POST). Will my ATA-66 hard drive work on the Intel SE440BX-2 Motherboard?The IDE controller integrated into the Intel SE440BX-2 Motherboard supports Ultra DMA modes 0,1, and 2. Ultra DMA mode 2, also known as ATA-33 or Ultra DMA 33, is the highest transfer mode supported by the Intel SE440BX-2 Motherboard. The motherboard hardware cannot support the maximum transfer rate of the ATA-66 drives. ATA66 hard drives will only operate up to ATA-33 on the Intel SE440BX-2 Motherboard. Please refer to the Technical Product Specification and the Motherboard Specification Update for more complete details on the various transfer modes.


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Quiz no.2

How to Partition a Hard Drive

Hard disks can be partitioned to run separate operating systems on the same disk, or to break down a disk into manageable chunks for storage. Partitioning is performed on a new or reformatted disk. These instructions describe using FDISK for PCs using DOS 3 or later.

Instructions :

STEP 1: Start the computer in DOS. The screen will show the C:/ prompt.

STEP 2: Type "FDISK." The partition window will appear with menu options.

STEP 3: Enter 5 if you're partitioning a second drive, and select the drive; otherwise, skip to the next step.

STEP 4: Enter 1 (Create DOS Partition or Logical DOS Drive).

STEP 5: Enter 2 (Create Extended DOS) to create a partition.

STEP 6: Enter N when the program asks if you want to use the maximum available size.

STEP 7: Designate the amount of disk space to allocate to the second partition (the partition will be assigned the next drive letter).

STEP 8: Type a name for the new partition and press Enter. The partition menu will appear.

STEP 9: Repeat steps 5 through 8 to create additional partitions.

STEP 10: Press Esc to exit the partition command.

STEP 11: Format the newly created partitions (see "How to Format a Hard Drive").


Tips & Warnings

Be sure to allocate ample disk space (about 1 GB) on the C drive to hold Windows software and temp files created by other software programs.
Commercial products, such as Partition Magic, make hard disk partitioning much easier.
If you use FDISK from a Windows 98 start-up disk, the computer will ask if you want to enable large disk support. Enter Y for hard drives larger than 512 MB. Be sure to create partitions greater than 514 MB.
The FDISK procedure deletes all files on the hard disk. This action is not reversible. Be sure to back up any files you want to keep.
If the disk capacity displayed in the FDISK menu doesn't match your hard drive, then your system doesn't support larger disk drives. Use disk management software, such as Disk Manager or EZ-Drive, to provide support for larger drives.





How do I recover re-partitioned drive(s)?

What is partition?To divide memory or mass storage into isolated sections. In DOS systems, you can partition a disk, and each partition will behave like a separate disk drive. Partitioning is particularly useful if you run more than one operating system. For example, you might reserve one partition for Windows and another for UNIX. In addition, partitioning on DOS and Windows machines can improve disk efficiency. This is because the FAT system used by these operating systems automatically assigns cluster size based on the disk size: the larger the disk, the larger the cluster. Unfortunately, large clusters can result in a wasted disk space, called slack space. There is an entire sector of the software industry devoted to building utilities that let you partition your hard disk, such as Fdisk, Partition Magic and Super Fdisk.
Explanation: Use partition tools (such as Fdisk, Partition Magic, Super Fdisk) to repartition hard drives is a common occurrence but care must be taken as if it is done incorrectly or problems on the hard disk exist, data will be lost.Frequently when a repartition is attempted the program will not terminate correctly, crashing before it finishes. This can be due to corruption of the logical disk structure, physical problems (e.g. bad sectors on the hard disk), incorrect software installation etc. Such as Partition Magic in the wrong operation, unexpected termination in resizing partition or program crash due to power error or more problems of the hard disks (e.g. due to bad sectors etc.). Where previously the computer would boot and be usable, systems often refuse to start and may produce the following error messages: (these errors are frequently displayed on a black screen with white text)
No boot device
Operating System not found
Primary Hard Disk not found. Press F1 to Continue
Master Boot Record Not Found
Invalid or corrupt FAT
Invalid partition table entries
Invalid sector
Cannot find file or program
Invalid command.com
Primary/Secondary Hard disk failure
Non system disk
Disk error
Data Recovery Steps: Recovery of data from re-partitioned hard drives is often complicated and time consuming. First we recommend that you create the hard drive image and use our professional partition recovery tool - Partition Table Doctor to recover original partition. If Partition Table Doctor cannot help you, we recommend that you can use professional data recovery software, such as Data Recovery Wizard to recover files. Please see:Download Buy Now Find out more...Note: Under no circumstances should you attempt to run Scandisk or Chkdsk on the hard drive. Doing this will may very well compound the problem as it will further damage an already damaged system. For more information read cautionary Scandisk and Chkdsk hard disk notes.


How to Format Hard drive
If you want to format a hard drive while using or installing Windows XP, you've come to the right place. This can be very useful for clearing everything off a secondary drive or when installing a fresh copy of Windows. Formatting a computer hard drive is simple and can help eliminate viruses and other hard to resolve problems.
Preparation

Instructions

STEP 1: When you format a computer hard drive you will lose everything that is on the drive. Therefore it is very important to back up anything you might want later. Additionally, if you are going to be formatting and installing Windows you need to make sure you have the discs for any applications or 3rd party hardware you use since you will need to re-install your programs and drivers after re-installing Windows.

STEP 2: Take a moment to think of anything that you have on the computer that you wouldn't want to lose. Generally you probably want everything in your My Documents folder, you also want to save things like your favorites or bookmarks from you web browser. Remember that each user on the computer has her own My Documents folder, Desktop items and Favorites/Bookmarks.

STEP 3: Now save everything to a CD, DVD or a hard drive that you will not be formatting.

Tips & Warnings
You can find How-To articles on saving your data right here on eHow.
Formatting a Secondary Hard Drive

Instructions

STEP 1: Right-Click on the “My Computer” icon either on your desktop or in the Start Menu, and select “Manage.”

STEP 2: A new window titled “Computer Management” comes up. Select “Storage” from the left hand side by clicking it once, then select “Disk Management(local)” from the right side by double-clicking it.

STEP 3: Now in the lower part of the main frame (right side) of the window you should see a nice visual of all your hard drives. Each line is a different drive. Each box on a line (with a colored bar at the top and a size displayed in MB or GB) is a partition on the drive. Partitions are separations of space on a drive, unless you are doing something specific that requires multiple partitions you only want one partition per drive.

STEP 4: First you must delete any existing partitions on the drive you are going to format. You do this by right-clicking on the partition's box and selecting “Delete Partition...” Since you already know that you will be deleting everything on the drive, and have already backed everything up, you can safely say yes to any warning the computer presents you with.

STEP 5: If there are multiple partitions make sure you have saved everything off them since they might each have different drive letters (i.e. “D:” or “F:”). Then repeat the above step for each of them. If you only want to format one partition that is OK and you can continue to the next step without deleting the other partitions.

STEP 6: The box for the drive to be formatted should now have a black bar at the top of it and should say “Unallocated” under its size (see picture). Right click on it and select “New Partition...” the New Partition Wizard comes up.

STEP 7: In the New Partition Wizard click next. On the next page make sure “Primary Partition” is selected and click next. Now make the size equal to the maximum (it should already be set to it), click next again. On the next page the computer will automatically choose the first available drive letter for the new drive, however if you like you can choose another drive letter from the drop down menu, then click next.

STEP 8: Finally the New Partition Wizard asks if you would like to format the new partition and if so what format. If your computer will be sharing files over a network with a Windows ME, 98, or 95 computer select “FAT32” otherwise choose “NTFS” as it is faster and more secure. Leave the “Allocation unit size” as “Default.” In the “Volume label” field enter whatever name you want the drive to have, simple is better and avoid using spaces. Lastly, if the drive is brand new and has never been used before check the “Perform a quick format” box, if the drive has been used before leave this box unchecked. Leave the “Enable file and folder compression” box unchecked and click next. Then on the next page click finish.

STEP 9: The wizard will now spend a little while formatting the drive. On old or large drives this may take a while. Do not close the “Computer Management” window until it finishes, you will know it is done when the word under the size of the drive changes from “Formatting” to “Healthy” and the name and drive letter you chose for the new drive show up. After it is finished you are done and can proceed to use your newly formatted drive.

Formatting and Installing from the Windows XP CD

Instructions

STEP 1: This section explains how to reformat a drive from the Windows XP installation CD. This can be used when installing a fresh copy of Windows onto a computer. Here it is especially important to backup all of your important information because upon formatting you will lose EVERYTHING that used to be on the drive. This includes all applications and device drivers, so you must backup everything you can.

STEP 2: Insert your Windows XP installation disc into your CD drive (Home or Pro it does not matter).

STEP 3: Restart your computer. On the first screen that comes up as your computer starts it should say at the bottom a key that you can press to change the Boot Sequence (may also be called Boot Device or Boot Order), press whatever key is specified. If your computer does not give you the option to change the boot sequence directly from the startup screen you will need to enter your BIOS Setup by pressing whichever key your computer specifies for Setup, and then from the BIOS setup you need to change your boot order so that the CD drive is before Hard Disks. If all you see right when your computer starts up is a splash screen with the computer manufactuer's name press the 'Esc' key to display which keys to press for boot sequence or BIOS setup.

STEP 4: Now as you computer boots a little more it will say “Press any key to boot from CD..” press a key to do so.

STEP 5: The CD will load up a blue screen and then spend a while loading files it needs. When it is finished it will list a few options mainly “Press ENTER to set up Windows XP,” press Enter or Return.

STEP 6: Now you will be at a screen to select where to install Windows to, this is where you can delete old partitions and format drives. The box in the bottom half of the screen shows all your drives and the partitions that exist on them. Use the Up and Down arrow keys to highlight your “C:” partition and press the 'D' key (if all that shows up is “Unpartitioned space” and you have no C: or D: partitions skip this step). On the next screen press the 'L' key to finalize deleting the partition.

STEP 7: Now you are back on the screen to choose where to install Windows. The box on the lower half of the screen should no longer show a partition but simply have an entry “Unpartitioned space xxxxxMB.” Select this with the arrow keys and press the 'C' key to create a partition on the drive. The next screen tells you the minimum and maximum sizes the partition can be and lets you pick the size. The default size is the maximum, but double check that the number entered is the maximum and hit enter.

STEP 8: Now you will again be back at the choose where to install Windows screen only this time you will have a partition that looks something like this “C: Partition1 [New (Raw)] xxxxxxMB.” Highlight this entry and press enter.

STEP 9: The next screen lets you choose which filesystem to format the drive with. If your computer will be sharing files over a network with a Windows ME, 98, or 95 computer select “FAT32” otherwise choose NTFS as it is faster and more secure. If the drive is brand new and has never been used before then use one of the options that ends in “(Quick)” otherwise choose one of the lower down options. Use the arrow keys to select the proper one and press Enter or Return.

STEP 10: From here you are all set and the installation of Windows will proceed starting with a format of your drive. This will take a while (over half an hour) so you can go take a little break.

Overall Tips & Warnings

YOU MUST BACKUP BEFORE FORMATTING OR YOU WILL LOSE DATA YOU NEED