Chapter 1: Motherboards, processors, and memory Flashcards
What does ATX stand for?
Advanced Technology Extended
What does ITX stand for?
Information Technology Extended
What are form factors for motherboards / system boards?
ATX mATX mITX (nano, pico, and mobile)
What does USB stand for?
Universal Serial Bus
What does SATA stand for?
Serial Advanced Technology Attachment
What does PCIe stand for?
Peripheral Component Interconnect express
Briefly describe what bus architecture is
Signal pathways for transmitting data from one component (within the PC) to another.
Briefly describe what a chipset is?
A collection of chips or circuits that perform interface and peripheral functions for the processor. It is usually the circuitry that provides interfaces for the memory, exp cards and onboard peripherals
Chipsets can be divided into to subsets known as what?
Northbridge and Southbridge
What is the function of the Northbridge subset of a chipset?
Manages performance / communication between CPU and memory, and PCIe controllers
What is the function of the southbridge subset of a chipset?
Connected and controlled by the northbridge, southbridge manages communications to the slower onboard peripherals such as USB, serial ports, LAN, floppy, PCI
Where is cache memory stored?
Between the CPU and RAM
CPU sockets come in two types
PGA pin grid array LGA land grid array
IDE stands for what?
Integrated drive electronics
What is firmware?
Any software that is encoded in hardware that can be fun without any extra instruction from the OS
What is BIOS?
Basic Input Output System. A type of firmware that boots the system and allows the operating system to interact with certain hardware in lieu of a more complex driver to do so. At a basic level BIOS controls system boot options such as the sequence of drives from which it look for operating systems.
What is UEFI?
Unified Extensible Firmware Interface
What is POST?
Power On Self Test
What does CMOS stand for and what does it do?
Complimentary Metal Oxide Semiconductor. This is a chip that keeps a track of information such as date, time, CPU settings, boot sequences etc even when the system is switched off.
What does multicore mean?
Cores are the instruction pathways within the CPU. Older, single core CPU’s could only do one thing at a time. Newer CPU’s have multicore meaning they can do more tasks at one. Multicore is effectively many CPU’s in one.
What is hyperthreading?
HTT or hyperthreaing technology refers to [intels] form of simulteanous multithreading, where a CPU can have multiple instructions operating on separate data in parallel.
What is throttling?
CPU throttling allows for reducing the operating frequency of the CPU during times of less demand or during battery operation.
what is overclocking?
Increasing the speed at which a CPU works past the point the manufacturer recommends. This requires more voltage and creates more heat which can shortne the life of the CPU.
What is the difference between 32 and 62 bit systems?
data lines between the CPU and the primary memory of the system can be 32 or 62 bits wide. The wider the bus the more data can be processed.
What is DRAM?
Dynamic Random Access Memory
what is SRAM
Static Random Access Memory?
What is ROM?
Read Only Memory
Briefly describe SDRAM
Synchronous DRAM was an early form of RAM. It Shared a common clock signal with the computer’s system bus clock. This feature tied it to the FSB and hence the CPU, eleminating the need to configure the CPU to wait for the memory to catch up, which needed to be done in earlier RAM.
Briefly describe SDR SDRAM
Single Data Rate DRAM. This followed on from SDRAM. Now considered legacy technology. With this memory, everytime the system clock ticks, 1 bit of data can be transmitted per data pin, limiting the bit rate per pin to the corresponding value of the clock frequency. So, with today’s CPU’s using a data-bus width of 8 bytes, a 100MHz clock signal produces 800MBps
what is DDR SDRAM?
Double Data Rate SDRAM. Earns its name by doubling the transfer rate of SDR SDRAM. A 100 MHz clock signal gives a DDR SDRAM system the impression of a 200MHz clock compared to SDR SDRAM. Multiplying this by 8 bytes per transfer cycle, the data rate is 1600MBps.
What is DDR2 SDRAM?
think of DDR2 as yet another multipler in the SDRAM technology. Using DDR2, a 100MHz clock, data transfers at 4 operations per cycle (effective 400MHz FSB) and at 8 bytes per operation, for a total of 3200MBps.
What is DDR3 SDRAM
Designed to roughly double the performance of DDR2 SDRAM.
What is SRAM?
Static Random Access Memory. Doesn’t requite refresh signals like DRAM which make it more expensive but a lot faster. SRAM is classically used for cache memory.
What is ROM?
Read Only Memory. Usually used to store BIOS as this normally doesn’t change often.
what is DIMM?
Dual Inline Memory Module.
Explains some of the features of DIMM (DDR2, DDR3, DDR4)
DDR2 and DDR3 have 240 pins and a single key notch, but the key notch is in a different place (you cannot place a DDR2 DIMMS into DDR3 slots amd vice versa) DDR4 DIMMS are the same length as DDR2/3 but taller and have 288 pins.
what is SODIMM?
Small Outline Duel Inline Memory Module. RAM packages for laptops and netbooks. As per DIMM for PC’s DDR2/3/4 have differing key notches meaning they are not interchagable.
What kind of fans might be found in a computer?
Front panel fan, Exhaust fan, CPU fan, GPU fan, Power Unit Fan, someone motherboads may also have fans for the memory and chipsets.
What are the two main fan connections on the motherboard?
3 and 4 pin connections (the extra pin on the 4 pin connection is used to monitor fan speed in BIOS
What must be remembered when considering airflow through the computer?
The rear fans should always follow the orientation of the power supply fan
What are you options for cooling memory?
passive - using the ambient case airflow within the computer. This requires heat sinks or heat spreaders to be placed on the memory.
Active - Forcing air over the memory using high spead fans
What are the options for cooling hard drives?
The active cooling bay - a device in which the hard drive sits, which contains a fan to cool the drive.
Passive - You can also get heat sinks for hard drives
What are the three most important CPU cooling methods?
Air, Liquid and Fanless / Passive
