Selecting Components 1 Flashcards
What are the important factors to consider when selecting a new motherboard?
Compatability with pre-existing components.
What form factor based concerns are there when selecting a new motherboard?
That the MB fits where the previous one did.
What adapter based concerns are there when selecting a new motherboard?
That the expansion slots fit with the adapter cards.
That the MB fits with the Power supply.
Why is it important to get a good/compatible chipset when selecting a new motherboard?
Compatability concerns.
Allows for multiple USBs, eSATA connections, surround sound and video.
How does data travel through a motherboard?
Through a collection of wires known as a bus.
How is the speed at which data travels through a bus measured?
In MHz or GHz.
What are the two tyical bus sizes?
32-bit and 64-bit.
What form of bus do PCI expansions slots utilise?
Parallel buses which send multiple bits over multiple wires simultaneously.
What form of bus do PCIe expansion slots use?
Serial buses which send one bit at a time at a much faster rate.
What are processor chips?
A series of transistors interconnected by wires.
What are the limiting factors of processor chips?
Transmitting data between transistors and wires creates delays.
Transistors changing state from on to off creates heat. This heat build up can create errors.
What is the Front Side Bus?
The path between the CPU and the Northbridge.
What does the FSB do?
It connects different components such as the chipset, expansion cards and RAM.
What are the two classifications of processor?
32-bit.
64-bit.
When may new RAM be necessary?
When an application lockus up or a computer displays frequent error messages.
