Motherboard BIOS configuration of the IBM 5170 is referred to by IBM as SETUP. Some people refer to it as CMOS SETUP.
Some reasons for running the SETUP procedure are:
• You have changed an option in the 5170 (e.g. add/remove RAM, change video card type, ...)
• You have replaced a dead/low battery
• Somehow, the SETUP has become corrupted, and you need to correct that
The IBM way of running the SETUP procedure is to boot the 5170 from the 'Diagnostics for the IBM Personal Computer AT' floppy, however other methods are available.
IMPORTANT:
The following assumes that your IBM 5170's motherboard is fitted with IBM 5170 BIOS ROM's, i.e. not swapped out for non-IBM ones.
If non-IBM BIOS ROM's are fitted, the following may not work (it depends on the particular BIOS).
METHOD 1 - THE IBM WAY: USING THE AT DIAGNOSTICS FLOPPY
This method requires that you have the 'Diagnostics for the IBM Personal Computer AT' 5.25" floppy.
If you don't have that floppy, but you have the means to create a 360K sized 5.25" floppy from an image file, then an image of the floppy is on this link.
Click here for the procedure on how to use the floppy.
METHOD 2 - TYPING CODE INTO BASIC
With this method, you do not need a floppy.
The 5170 will be allowed to boot into BASIC, and then you'll type in some BASIC commands.
GSETUP.EXE is a 'generic' third-party SETUP program, suitable for most early AT-class computers. It is suitable for the 5170 (if the 5170 has an IBM BIOS).
With this method, you will temporarily connect a 1.44M diskette drive to the 5170, and then boot from a 720K boot diskette (actually, a 1.44M diskette made to look like a 720K one).