EXPERIMENT-1

STUDY OF MOTHERBOARD

The computer motherboard connects all the parts (components) of a computer together. Main board,
baseboard, mobo (abbreviation), system board, MB (abbreviation), logic board are the synonyms of
computer’s motherboard.
The motherboard is single platform to connect all of the parts (components) of a computer. All the
component such as RAM stick, hard disk drive, optical drives, processor, processor fan and external card
are plug-in into motherboard. It is considered as the backbone of a computer.
The motherboard may be characterized by the Form factor chipset type of processor socket used
Form factor refers to the motherboard’s geometry, dimensions, arrangement and electrical
requirements. Advanced Technology Extended (ATX) is the most common design of motherboard for
desktop computers.
Chipset is a circuit, which is used to control the resources such as the bus interface with the processor,
cache memory and RAM, expansion cards, etc. It used to coordinate data transfers between the various
components of the computer.
The processor socket is a connector into which the processor is mounted. The Basic Input Output System
(BIOS) and Complementary Metal-Oxide Semiconductor (CMOS) are present on the motherboard.
Components of Motherboard
The important components of a Motherboard are given below:
Mouse & keyboard:
There are two types of keyboard and mouse connectors. First type is called PS/2 and second one is
called USB.
USB (Universal serial bus):
USB is Universal serial bus. It is used for connection for PC. There
are different devices which is used to connect with USB port such as mouse, keyboards, scanners,
cameras, and even printers.USB connector is used to connect computer motherboard and a peripheral
device. You can insert or remove peripheral device connect by USB connector without restarting your
system.
Parallel port:
Most of old printers are used to connect by parallel port. Parallel port used more than one wire for
sending or receiving multiple bits of data at once, while serial port uses only one wire. Parallel ports use
a 25-pin female DB connector.
CPU Chip:
CPU refers to a processor, the central processing unit, also called the microprocessor performs all the
task that take place inside a computer system. It is also known as brain of computer.
RAM slots :
RAM slots is for attaching RAM on it in general desktop we can see two slot of RAM but in server
motherboard we can see 4+ slot of RAM.RAM comes in different size(memory).
Floppy controller:
In old motherboard the floppy drive connects to the computer via a 34-pin ribbon cable, one end of
ribbon cable is connect to floppy drive and other is connected to the motherboard.
IDE controller:
IDE that is Integrated Drive Electronics, also called as ATA or Parallel ATA (PATA).IDE controller is
responsible for controlling the hard drive. Today’s computers no longer come with a IDE controller.
PCI slot:
PCI stands for Peripheral Component Interface, PCI slot allows you to insert expansion cards into your
computer. PCI used to connect additional PCI device like network cards, sound cards, modems, video
cards. Some of today’s computers no longer come with a PCI expansion slot. Its connect audio, video
and graphics.
ISA slot:
ISA stands for Industry Standard Architecture, It is the standard architecture of the Expansion bus. Its
connect modem and input devices.
CMOS Battery:
CMOS is complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor is used to store BIOS setting in computer
motherboard. CMOS Battery also store date and time.
AGP slot:
The Accelerated Graphics Port (AGP) is a high-speed point-to-point channel for attaching a video card to
a computer system, If you have a modern motherboard, you will almost certainly notice a single
connector that looks like a PCI slot.A fast port for a graphics card
CPU slot:
The processor socket (also called a CPU socket) is the connector on the motherboard that connect a
CPU.
Power supply plug in:
The Power supply provides the necessary electrical power to make the computer system operate. The
power supply takes standard 110-V AC power and converts into +/-12-Volt, +/-5-Volt, and 3.3-Volt DC
power.
The power supply connector has 20-pins, and the connector can go in only one direction.
The shape and layout of a motherboard is called the form factor. The form factor affects where
individual components go and the shape of the computer's case.
The CPU is the first thing that comes to mind when many people think about a computer's speed and
performance. The faster the processor, the faster the computer can think. To select a CPU one should
select a motherboard based on that CPU. For example, if one uses one of the new multi-core chips made
by Intel or AMD, then a motherboard with the correct socket for those chips will be needed. CPUs
simply will not fit into sockets that don't match their PGA (PIN GRID ARRAY).The CPU communicates
with other elements of the motherboard through a chipset. The chipset is the "glue" that connects the
microprocessor to the rest of the motherboard and therefore to the rest of the computer. On a PC, it
consists of two basic parts -- the Northbridge and the Southbridge. All of the various components of the
computer communicate with the CPU through the chipset. The Northbridge connects directly to the
processor via the front side bus (FSB). A memory controller is located on the Northbridge, which gives
the CPU fast access to the memory. The Southbridge is slower than the Northbridge, and information
from the CPU has to go through the Northbridge before reaching the Southbridge.