The

Motherboard
Motherboard
Form Factors
Chipsets
Connectors
Buses
BIOS

Motherboard

the main printed circuit board that resides

inside the PC
mainboard, system board, or planar board
equipped with sockets where the processor,
memory, plug-in cards, daughterboard, and
peripheral devices are connected
heart of the PC

Motherboard
Motherboard Connectivity
Mouse & keyboard
2. USB
3. Parallel port
4. CPU Chip
5. RAM slots
6. Floppy controller
7. IDE controller
8. PCI slot
9. ISA slot
10.CMOS Battery
11.AGP slot
12.CPU slot
13.Power supply plug in
1.

Form Factors

industry sets of specification that refer to

the physical size, dimension, and shape of
the motherboard

Obsolete Motherboards

PC/XT
Full-size AT
Baby-AT
LPX

Form Factors

PC/XT

XT had 8 slots while PC had only 5

XT eliminated the use of the little-used cassette
port for saving BASIC programs on cassette tapes

Form Factors

Full-size AT

allows a very large board with a size of 12 wide by

13.8
was produced to accommodate the 16-bit 286
microprocessor

Form Factors

Baby-AT

a reduced-size AT motherboard; a smaller version of

full-size AT
slight modification in the screw hole to fit into an ATstyle case

Form Factors

LPX

developed by Western Digital

used in low-profile systems to reduce manufacturing
cost
has a riser card used to connect the expansion cards
horizontally

Form Factors

ATX Form Factors

Form Factor

ATX

mini-ATX

micro-ATX

Use
Standard tower and desktop
systems; most common form
factor from mid-1996 through the
present; supports high-end
systems
A slightly smaller version of ATX
that fits the ATX chassis; many ATX
motherboards are sold as Mini-ATX
motherboards
Smaller version of ATX; used in
mid-range systems; fits the
microATX or ATX chassis

Max. Slots

Form Factors

mini-ATX

uses a 170mm (6.7-inch) square motherboard form

factor
smaller version of ATX and is backward-compatible
with microATX
use very small power supplies (less than 100 W)

Form Factors

micro-ATX

reduced size compared to the standard ATX for a

smaller chassis and power supply
backward compatible with ATX form factor and fullsize ATX cases
fewer I/O bus expansion slots and upgrade options
are severely limited

Form Factors

ATX

widely used in low-cost home PC and small form-factor corporate

PC
an open, non-proprietary industry specification originally developed
by Intel in 1995
Built-in I/O external connector panel that eliminates the need for
cables that runs from the motherboard to the rear of the case.
Single main internal power supply connector that is very easy to
plug and cannot be installed incorrectly
CPU and memory is relocated next to the power supply so that they
cannot interfere with any bus extension cards
Internal I/O connectors for the floppy and hard drive are relocated
near the drive bay so that cables can be shorter
CPU and main memory are designed to improve overall system
cooling.
Due to elimination of cables to external port connectors, it is

Form Factors

ATX Motherboard and rear panel

connections

Chipsets

group of microchip on the motherboard that controls the

flow of data and instructions to and from the CPU
controls the memory cache, power management, external
buses and some peripherals

Earlier chipsets are composed of the following

architecture:

North Bridge provides connection between the highspeed processor bus (400/266/200/133/100/66MHz), AGP
(533/266/133/66MHz), and PCI (33MHz) buses
South Bridge interfaces the PCI (33MHz) bus to the
8MHz ISA bus

Chipsets

Accelerated Hub Architecture

Chipsets

Advantages of Hub Design

considered faster because it has increased

throughput
Improved over-all performance due to
(Peripheral Component Interconnect) PCI Load
removal
requires only 15 PCI signals thereby reducing
EMF generation compared to no less than 64
PCI signals to be routed on the motherboard

Chipsets

Types of Chipsets

Early Intel 386/486 Chipsets

first

chipset developed by Intel that is not very

successful

Fifth-Generation (P5 Pentium Class)

Chipsets
first

Pentium chipset released by Intel on the

market
do not support AGP

Chipsets

Sixth-Generation (P6 Pentium Pro/II/III

Class) Chipsets

Intel
Intel
Intel
Intel

810, 810E
815, 815E
820, 820E
840

Seventh-Generation (Pentium 4) Chipsets

Intel
Intel
Intel
Intel

845,
848,
915,
945,

850
865, 875
925
955, 975

Chipsets

Third-Party Pentium-4 Chipsets

SiS Chipsets

SiS
SiS
SiS
SiS
SiS
SiS

650,
645
648,
658,
661
649,

651
655
659
656

Chipsets

AMD Athlon/AthlonXP/Duron Chipsets

AMD 750
AMD 760

AMD Athlon 64 and Sempron Chipsets

AMD 8000 (8151)

Chipsets

VIA Chipsets

Via Apollo P4X266

ProSavage P4M266
Apollo P4X400, P4X400A,
PT800, PM800, PT880, PM880
PT880 Ultra, PT894, PT894 Pro

Connectors

standardized by Intel in October 2000 because

the chassis should match the motherboard
placement and pin assignment of some
headers still vary from manufacturer to
manufacturer
Every motherboard has a set of pins that
connect to the front panel of your case.
pins usually consist of power switch, reset
switch, power LED, hard drive activity LED and
internal speaker connectors

Connectors

Typical Motherboard connectors

Connectors

Front panel switch/LED connections using 2-pin connectors

Connectors
USB Technologies

1. USB 1.0
2. USB 2.0

increases data transfer rate up to a maximum throughput of

480Mbps, which is 40 times faster than USB 1.1
ideal for connecting high-speed USB interface such as USB
HDD, digital cameras MO3 players, printers, modems and the
like.

3. USB 3.0

uses the same concepts of USB 2.0 but with improvements

and new implementation
maximum transmission speed of up to 5Gbps which is 10 time
faster than USB 2.0
reduces the time required for data transmission, reduces
power consumption, and is backward compatible with USB 2.0

Connectors

10-pin Dual-USB header & Configuration

Connectors

IEEE 1394 (FireWire/i.LINK) header connector

configuration

Connectors

Front panel audio header connector configuration

Connectors

Infrared data front panel header connector

configuration

Connectors

Fan power connectors

Buses

an electrical channel that transfers bits internally

within the circuitry of a computer allowing all of the
devices to communicate with each other.
common pathway across which data can travel
within a computer

Bus carries the following:

electrical power
control signals
memory addresses
Data

Buses

System Bus

a local bus that works synchronously with

the CPU and the system clock
connected directly to the CPU and is
synchronized with the CPU

Types of system bus:

Data Bus
Address Bus
Control Bus

Buses

Data Bus

Address Bus

group of lines on the system bus that allow data to flow

back-and-forth between devices
communicates memory addresses and I/O devices to
tell devices where data flowing on the data bus should
travel

Control Bus

coordinates activity between various devices to

prevent data collision

Data collision
the

corruption of data resulting from simultaneous

use of the data or address bus

Buses

Local I/O Bus

a type of local bus designed to support fast input

and output devices such as hard drives and video

Types of local I/O bus:

Video Electronics Standards Association (VESA)
Peripheral Component Interconnect (PCI)
Accelerated Graphics Port (AGP)
PCI-Express

Buses

Video Electronics Standards Association (VESA)

introduced

by NEC (August 1992 to 1994) to boost performance

of video display and buses
eliminated the bottleneck experienced by relatively slow speed
buses

Peripheral Component Interconnect (PCI)

a

32/64-bit local bus designed by Intel and used in PCs and

Macintoshes
introduced the mezzanine bus that added additional layer to the
original bus configuration instead of tapping directly to the
processor bus

Accelerated Graphics Port (AGP)

focused

primarily for graphics and video

PCI-Express
can

send data up to 2000 Mbps

increase in signaling speed could burst up to 8000 Mbps
compared to previous PCI design with only 133Mbps transfer rate

Buses

Expansion Bus

works asynchronously with the CPU at a much

slower rate

Types of local I/O bus:

Industry Standard Architecture (ISA)
Extended ISA (EISA)
Micro Channel Architecture (MCA)
Universal Serial Bus (USB)

Buses

8-bit and 16-bit buses

Industry Standard Architecture (ISA)

Industry Standard Architecture

developed by IBM PC
Two versions:
1.
2.

8-bit ISA developed by IBM PC in 1981 with speed of

4.77MHz for the PC and XT systems
16-bit ISA introduced by IBM in 1984 parallel to the
release of their AT system

Buses

32-bit buses

Micro Channel Architecture (MCA)

EISA (Extended ISA)

has plug and play feature which does not need jumpers
and switches on motherboard and expansion card
a 32-bit version of ISA with backward compatibility with
older 8-bit and 16-bit ISA cards

Universal Serial Bus (USB)

newer asynchronous serial bus standard designed to

bring Plug and Play capability for connecting external
peripherals

BIOS

a low-level software that controls the system

hardware
link between the hardware and the operating
system
device drivers or drivers

Three possible sources of BIOS in a PC:

1. Motherboard ROM
2. Adapter card ROM
3. Loaded into RAM from disk

BIOS
1.Motherboard ROM
contains the initial software drivers to run the
system

2.Adapter card ROM

commonly used for devices that should be active
during boot time
commonly found on video cards since it should
be active during boot time

3.Loaded into RAM from disk

commonly used for devices that do not need to
be active during boot time

BIOS
realtime clock/nonvolatile memory
(RTC/NVRAM)
CMOS RAM
two separate chips that can be found on
the motherboard
a portion of its memory was dedicated to
the clock function while the rest was used
to store BIOS Setup information

BIOS
Four Main Functions of BIOS:
1.
2.
3.
4.

POST
Setup
Bootstrap loader
BIOS

BIOS
1.POST
tests the PCs components such as processor, memory,
keyboard, etc

2.Setup
can be accessed by pressing a special key during POST
enables configuration of PC settings such as date and
time, passwords, power-management, boot-drive
sequence, etc

3.Bootstrap loader
reads the disk drives and looks for a master boot record

4.BIOS
actual collection of drivers that serves as an interface
between the hardware and operating system after boot up

BIOS
Four Main Types of ROM chips:
1.
2.
3.
4.

Read-only memory (ROM)

Programmable ROM (PROM)
Erasable PROM (EPROM)
Electrically EPROM (EEPROM)

BIOS
1. Read-only memory (ROM)
2. Programmable ROM (PROM)
Once programmed, it cannot be erased
also referred to as one-time programmable (OTP)
chip

3. Erasable PROM (EPROM)

variation of PROM that can be erased using
intense ultraviolet light

4. Electrically EPROM (EEPROM)

also called flash ROM
can be erased and reprogrammed directly in a PC
without removing the chip from the system

BIOS
Popular ROM BIOS manufacturers:
1. American Megatrends, Inc. (AMI)
2. Phoenix Technologies
3. Award Software

BIOS
BIOS Setup keystrokes:
1. AMI BIOS <Delete>
2. Phoenix BIOS (FirstBIOS Pro) <F2>
3. Award BIOS (FirstBIOS) <Delete> or <Ctrl +
Alt + Esc>
4. Microid Research (MR) BIOS <Esc>

BIOS
Setup Menu
Screen
Maintenance

Main
Advanced
Security
Power
Boot
Exit

Description
Specifies the processor speed and clears the
setup passwords. This menu is available
only in Configure mode, set by a jumper on
the board.
Allocates resources for hardware
components.
Specifies advanced features available
through the chipset.
Specifies passwords and security features.
Specifies power management features.
Specifies boot options and power supply
controls.
Saves and discards changes to the setup
program options.

BIOS Setup Menus