Asus A7V266-E losing bios settings

[vyrt1go]

i have the asus a7v266-e running in full jumper free mode with the configuration listed below

AMD athlon xp 1800+
2xIBM 7200rpm 60GB hdd's in RAID-0
2x256MB Crucial RAM
PNY gf3 ti-200
TDK 24x10x40 cdrw
AOpen 52x cdrom
SB Audigy x-gamer
3com NIC w/3xp processor
Enermax 430W switchable PSU
Windows XP Professional

my problem is this......when i first got the board, there was no selection in the bios for 1.75v core (default for axp 1800+)....it only went as low as 1.8v and my AGP aperature would only go as high as 128MB (i have a half gig of ram in the system...i should be able to select 256...the manual even says that it should go that high). that was with bios 1004b.....after i flashed with 1005, i was able to select 1.75v....but there is still the problem with the AGP aperature....and even if i select 128 and save and exit, the next time i enter the bios, it is set back to 32mb....frustrating....and if i unplug the system from the wall (....to head out for some lan action), or switch the psu off, i lose bios settings and my computer boots back up to the bios screen with the defaults loaded.....i had similar problems with the MSI K7T266A pro2-ru and had to send it back to MSI for a new BIOS chip....im having a hard time believing that i have 2 bad bios chips on two different boards.....could my psu be draining my cmos battery?......what the h3ll is going on and is anyone else noticing these same or similar problems with the a7v.....please HELP!!!!!

thanks.....

v

 

[Adul]

dead cmos battery?

 

[vyrt1go]

a dead cmos battery would explain why bios settings are not sticking when unplugged, of course, but its a 6 week old board.....and i had similar problems with the MSI board.....i have a hard time believing that i got two new boards, and two bad cmos batteries....something would have to be sucking the juice out of the batteries.....even at that, it doesnt explain why my agp aperature only goes up to 128MB and returns to 32 after a reboot (warm boot or cold boot)....all of the other settings stick (while plugged in anyway), just not the AGP aperature size.....anyone else?

btw.....i have been using the ASUS update utility to flash the bios from windows (winXP po)......and had no problems with unsuccessful flashes (at least the utility hasnt said anything)......

thanks again....

v