Can I safely clear the ESCD?

[edtrip]

I just built a system (my first) with an Abit zm6 and celeron 500. It had a voodoo 3 in the agp slot, an ensoniq audio in a PCI slot, and a CPI 33.6 modem in an ISA slot.Everything was working good and then it wasn't, Win 98 started to hang at boot up and told me I needed to clear upper memory in system configuration or something close to that. I didn't know what that was, so I reinstalled win98 instead, it didn't work, I formatted and reinstalled, that didn't work but I did notice (finally), ahhh, it only hangs after I reinstall the modem. I pulled the card, I hooked up a serial external modem, everythings working fine now.

BUT, what SHOULD I have done to fix the problem, instead of reinstalling? Was this error telling me to go into BIOS, into PNP/PCI Config, and change FORCE UPDATE ESCD from disabled to enabled, which would then clear the ESCD? Was that all I needed to do?
And can I clear it right now, when the hell should you clear the ESCD, does it do any harm to clear it, or will BIOS just reconfigure everything fresh?

I know its alot of questions, its probably some stupid questions, but the manuals not particularly helpful. Really would appreciate some answers. Thanks.

[RobRich]

I generally update the ESCD data upon installing or moving any devices in a system. I have never damaged a system when doing this, and it can prove effective with troublesome devices.

Robert Richmond

[Target]

The ESCD (Extended System Configuration Data) is a way for storing info about plug and play devices within the bios.

Both Windows and the bios access the ESCD area every time you boot your computer.

Forcing an update of the ESCD at boot-up will cause no harm to your PC, and its actually a pretty good idea to do it after each new device is installed (though its not always necessary). It forces the info detected by the bios about PNP devices and held in the ESCD to be fed to the Windows OS at boot time. Like RobRich, I have found it necessary to do so to resolve problems with some troublesome devices, namely modems.

In all cases I know of, when you enable the Force Update ESCD, upon the next successful boot, the system will set it back to disabled for you.