U s i n g t h e B I O S S e t u p U t i l i t y

3 USING THE BIOS SETUP UTILITY

BIOS (pronounced “bye-oss”) stands for basic input/output system. The BIOS operates at the boundary between the computer’s hardware (the processor, memory, and so on) and its software (the operating system and your programs), and effectively mediates between the two.

The BIOS is permanently encoded in an area of read-only memory (ROM), although it can be modified if necessary by an authorized maintainer.

BIOS Setup is a utility programmed into the computer’s BIOS ROM. Its main purpose is to allow you to view and alter the computer’s hardware configuration. It is also used to configure various security and power-saving options. Configuring the computer is necessary to ensure that the software you use can recognise and exploit the hardware’s capabilities.

The current configuration is kept in a special area of memory, called CMOS memory, and maintained by a small battery so that the configuration is preserved even while the computer is switched off.

Your computer arrives already configured, but may need to be configured again after you add or remove add-on options such as memory modules or expansion cards.

APRICOT 340 OWNER’S HANDBOOK 3/1