A+ 1001: Motherboard Flashcards
4 Form Factors
ATX:
MicroATX: 9.6X9.6
Mini ITX:
ITX:
I/O Area
xx
I/O Shield
Cover for I/O Area
Regardless of the Form Factor, they all have the same size shield
Northbridge/Southbridge
Chips were designed to work together in older systems
but today the chipset is only a Southbridge, the cpu handles the northbridge
Chipset
Determines what motherboard can do
Defines things like, how many memory cards or how many expansion slots, or how fast the ram can be, or how many usb ports, etc.
combine functions from many single function chips
Which cables are used to connect hard drives or SSD drives to the motherboard?
SATA cables, connects to the SATA HDD connectors
Why do motherboards have so many voltage regulators and capacitors?
Because the motherboards use varying voltages for different parts and chips
How can we tell that a motherboard is dead, by looking at the capacitors
When the capacitors top is bulged or rounded, instead of flat
Good thing to check for if you are buying second had motherboard
PCIe
Expansion bus that uses serial connections, instead of parallel like the older PCI busses
PCIe sockets are 16 lanes (x16) max, but can also come in 4 lane (x4) and 1 lane (x1)
Different kinds of connectors on the motherboard
- SATA HDD connectors
- PCIe
- USB connectors
- 2.2M pins (SSD)
Standouts
Are the pins on which the motherboard is placed within the case
Parts of a Case
- Front Panel
- Standouts
- Passthroughs
- Hard Drive mounts
- Slots
- PSU mount
- Fans
Installing the Motherboard
- First Assemble and test the motherboard to see if you can get to the setup screen
- Mount I/O shield
- Place Motherboard on standout pins and screw it down
- Attach cables
The largest motherboard form factor is?
ATX
The job of the South Bridge is to act as the interface between the CPU and what?
The South Bridge interfaces slow hardware such as hard drives and keyboards to the CPU. The CPU interacts directly with fast hardware including RAM and video cards.
Connectors with cables that plug into the motherboard are known as what?
Dongles
Keeping the wires in a case neat, out of the way and easy to identify is called what?
Cable management
Which critical components are found on the outside of the case?
Front-panel connections
Which is it best to do before mounting the motherboard in the case?
The best answer is to test the motherboard with a CPU and RAM installed. It is harder to install a CPU and RAM once the motherboard is mounted so removing them is not a good idea. It may be possible to connect cables to the motherboard before installing it into the case but it makes the installation challenging.
Which must be done before installing a motherboard into a case?
Install the I/O shield
