Breaking Through the BIOS Barrier: The Definitive BIOS Optimization Guide for PCs

By Adrian Wong and Wong

From a scholar in the field of computer hardware, this title applies a scientific rigorousness. This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0131455362
• ISBN13: 9780131455368
• Release Date: January 2004
• Publisher: Prentice Hall Ptr
• Length: 351 Pages
• Weight: 1.25 lbs.
• Dimensions: 8.8" x 0.8" x 6.8"

Customer Reviews

This is it!

If you are tired of spending hours trying to figure out what all those different BIOS settings do this is your book. This is the book that the motherboard manufacture should have supplied you with.

This book is amazing

Inside it you will find everything you want and need to know about the BIOS. If you're an overclocker, it's indispensible. If you're just curious about what all those settings do, it's great. The author's website is well-known in the enthusiast community and for good reason. Buy it.

Bios Bonanza

This guy knows his stuff. Plenty of information that can be practically applied. Recomended for anyone who is interested in tweaking or checking their Bios settings.

Only for the advanced user.

This book is for advanced user's only and not for the curious. If you don't know how to get into the BIOS on your computer, and what BIOS stands for then this isn't the book for you and should be left well enough alone. It is true that Adrian makes it sound simple but if you don't fully understand the changes your making you could seriously screw-up your computer, and the reason why companies like Dell make it harder to accidently access the BIOS on startup(crtl+alt+del) and not the freindly one key press on enthusiasts systems. I know that most of the people buying this book know this already but after reading the first review I felt a little caution should be excercised and not make it sound like it's as easy as operating a microwave.

Explaining the Arcane

When you are starting your computer if you hold down F8, or the DELETE key or perhaps some other key, you get into the BIOS setup routines. When you look at these screens you are presented with a bewildering array of optional settings. They are all, of course, clearly identified with some kind of gibberish like AGP to DRAM Prefetch. This book is organized so that inside the front and back covers are a listing of the BIOS options. Looking up AGP to DRAM Prefetch you are told that there is a Quick Review on Page 40 and a Detailed Description on Page 169. And after a little reading you will understand what this option does, and why you probably want it enabled. About 250 BIOS options are explained in this manner. There have been many times in the past when having such a book would have been invaluable. It is clearly written using words that will make sense to the computer literate and those maybe one step above novice.