Integrated motherboards – Have all peripheral device slots, input output ports, serial and parallel ports mounted on the board. Saves space and cheaper as compared to non-integrated motherboards. Disadvantage is that if an individual component of the motherboard fails, the whole board may need to be replaced
Non-Integrated motherboards – Have RAM slots integrated on the board. All the I/O ports such as serial and parallel port connectors, other controllers such as hard drive and floppy disk drives controllers are attached to the system using expansion boards
Desktop Motherboards – Used in personal computers and desktops
Server Motherboards – Designed to offer high-end services and supports various redundant technology
Laptop Motherboards – Have very advanced features, as compared to the desktop motherboards
Refers to motherboards physical shape, layout and positioning of components on it
Determines the type of system case it will fit into
Obsolete Form Factor :
Types of obsolete form factors :
Modern Form Factor :
Types of modern form factors :
Proprietary Form Factor :
Compaq and HP both use different form factors such as ATX and Micro ATX
Products sold by these companies are of different form factors
Motherboard contains slots, sockets and connectors for connecting various devices
Contains super I/O chip, slots for connecting various peripheral devices
Configure the motherboard using jumpers
Connectors :
On Board Disk Drive Connectors :
Hard drive, floppy drive and CD-ROM drive is connected to motherboard using on-board disk drive connectors
Primary connector used to connect storage devices is the Integrated Development Environment (IDE) port
Serial Advanced Technology Attachment (SATA) technology is used to connect the newer versions of hard drive
Keyboard and Mouse Connector :
Keyboard and mouse device are connected to (Personal System) PS/2 port of computer
Ports are located at the back side of the system
PS/2 port contains 6 holes and a notch in the middle
Power Supply Connector – Types of power connectors used by various power supplies are AT ands ATX power supply connector, ATX auxiliary power connector and ATX 12V connector
Serial and Parallel Port Connector – 9 pin serial port connector and 25 pin parallel port connector are used to connect various I/O devices
Universal Serial Bus (USB) - Offers Plug-and-Play support and also supplies power to the device
Expansion slots :
Motherboard has PCI slots where you can connect PCI cards.
Different PCI cards include LAN card, SCSI card and USB card
Extend the capacity of the existing motherboard
AGP slot is used to attach a graphic card
Audio/Modem Riser :
Card with capabilities of modem and audio
AMR slot is smaller than the standard PCI slot
Now used only for modems
Peripheral Component Interconnect (PCI) Slot :
Bus standard developed by Intel Corporation
Used for attaching peripheral devices to motherboard
Slots work at 33 MHz
newer variants are available that have a 64-bit wide bus and work at 33 MHz or 66 MHz
Data Transmission Rate of PCI is 133 MBps
PCI Extended (PCI-X) :
PCI Extended (PCI-X) is a standard designed jointly by HP, IBM, and Compaq
Increase the performance of high-bandwidth devices, such as Gigabit Ethernet and Fibre Channel
Fully backward compatible with PCI and data transmission rate is 1GBps
Comes in two variants: PCI-X 1.0 and PCI-X 2.0
PCI Express (PCI-E) :
Newest Peripheral Component Interconnect Special Interest Group’s specification for the I/O bus
Extends the capabilities of PCI bus
Having point-to-point, hot-pluggable and hot-swappable system bus
Data Transmission Rate of each lane is 250MBps
AGP Slot :
Accelerated Graphics Port (AGP) is used to display graphics and 3D images in efficient manner
Offers high data transfer speed between the video chipset and the CPU
AGP cards are available at different speeds, AGP 1x, 2x, 4x, 8x
Operate in a voltage of 1.5 to 3.3 volts
Front Side Bus :
Data Bus which carries two-way signal information between the processor and other peripheral and system devices within the computer
Peripherals devices include RAM, graphics processing units, hard disk, expansion cards, and system devices include the BIOS
CPU frequency is set as a multiple of FSB
Jumpers :
Small pins that enable you to configure motherboard settings
Performs different functions when it is shorted and when it is left open, without the shunt
Motherboard manual is a necessity when you deal with jumpers
Motherboards may have jumpers to set the color or mono monitor type, to set the cache memory type and size, to set the processor type, system recovery option and to discharge the CMOS RAM battery
Most of the motherboards currently available in the market have auto jumper setup option
Memory Slots :
Provide interface for attaching RAM on motherboard
Maximum number of slots depend on the motherboard
Memory slots are either Single Inline Memory Module (SIMM) or Double Inline Memory Module (DIMM)
SIMMs need to be inserted in pairs but DIMM may be inserted individually
CPU Socket :
Interface that connects CPU with motherboard
Consists of holes in which the pins of the processor are installed
Sockets are used with particular type of processor
Sockets already installed on board
Most of the sockets used are built on the Pin Grid Area (PGA) architecture
Complementary Metal Oxide Semiconductor (CMOS) batteries power CMOS chip of motherboard
Saves settings and time when computer is switched off
Last for around 5 years but it depends mainly on the environment in which it is used
Mostly made up of Lithium
Contains necessary code required to operate basic system utilities such as the display device, keyboard or disk drives
Built into Read Only Memory (ROM) of computer
Provides the basic input output functionality of the system
POST is the test conducted by BIOS
Single chip similar to system chipset
Controls I/O functions of motherboard
Smaller, slower speed devices are controlled by this chip such as floppy drive, serial ports, PS/2 mouse, some keyboard functions and parallel ports
Supports Enhanced Parallel Port (EPP) and the Extended Capabilities Port (ECP) technology
Regulates voltage supplied over a line
Protects devices from power surges and spikes
Installed on motherboard and regulates voltage that is needed by CPU
It is a DC to DC converter
Senses voltage needed by processors from the processor itself
Senses Voltage Identification (VID) from processor and supplies the voltage accordingly
Paths through which data is transferred between devices and components
Classified into two main categories :
System Bus - Connects the CPU, RAM and the optional buffer memory (cache)
I/O buses – Connects the CPU with other devices such as the peripheral devices
System bus is located on the CPU and other I/O buses branch out from the system bus
In new systems, the system bus is also called the Front Side Bus (FSB)
Bus Standards :
Different types of I/O buses that transfer data across components of the system
Common bus standards are :
Leading manufacturers are
The Intel 915, 945 and the 975 chipsets are the most common chipsets available today. 64 bit computing technology chipsets are also available today
Modern chipset consists of the Northbridge and the Southbridge
The chipset controls the data transfers between every component of the system
So the chipset that you choose must support the interface required by your CPU
Form Factor – Defines size and shape of board. While choosing a motherboard, you need to consider the different types of slots you require for your system. Choose a case that is large enough to fit the motherboard of the correct form factor
CPU Support – Should support different types of microprocessor and sockets. Before purchasing a motherboard, you need to consider the various processors that it supports. In the future, if you need to upgrade your processor, you may not have to change the whole motherboard
Memory slots – Should have more number of slots. To support new technology software user can upgrade the system in the future
Expansion Slots – A motherboard with more number of expansion slots can easily be expanded for supporting the various devices
SATA support – Allows higher transfer rates of data between hard disk and motherboard and should have SATA controller on it.
Number of Ports – Should have more number of USB and other ports to connect different devices to the system. Depending on the type of device to be attached to the system and the port that is required, the board should be purchased.
Hard Drive transfer speed and RAID support – Should support Hard drive of Ultra Direct Memory Access (UDMA) 133 and RAID
Bus Speed – Should have higher speed of FSB and BSB which allows faster transfer rate of data in and out of the processor
Chipset – Backbone of system and important part. Should support latest memory modules e.g. DDR II SDRAM, RDRAM or ECC memory. Also it should support AGP 4x or faster video and ATA-133 or faster hard drive support
