Common Options : Enabled, Disabled, ChipAway

Details

The Anti-Virus Protection is actually an enhanced version of the Virus Warning BIOS feature. Besides the standard system halt and flashing warning message whenever there's an attempt to write to the boot sector or partition table, this BIOS feature also offers more comprehensive anti-virus protection via built-in rule-based anti-virus code like ChipAway.

When you set it to Enabled, the BIOS will halt the system and flash a warning message whenever there's an attempt to access the boot sector or the partition table. Note that this only protects the boot sector and the partition table, not the entire hard disk.

This feature also causes problems with software that need to access the boot sector. One good example is the installation routine of Win95/98. When enabled, this feature will cause the installation routine to fail. Also, many disk diagnostic utilities that access the boot sector can trigger the system halt and error message as well. Therefore, you should disable this feature before running such software.

Alternatively, you can select the BIOS' internal rule-based anti-virus code. The code used in the reference motherboard is the ChipAway code. Enabling ChipAway enables the BIOS to provide better anti-virus protection by detecting boot viruses before they have a chance to infect the boot sector of any hard disk.

Note that this feature is useless for hard disks that run on external controllers with their own BIOS. Boot sector viruses will bypass the system BIOS with its Anti-Virus Protection feature and write directly to the hard disks. Such controllers include additional IDE or SCSI controllers that are either built into the motherboard or added in using cards.