A computer is a fairly complex expedient containing lots of distinct parts. This month I am going to take a look at one of the parts that you will find inside of your computer case and give you some idea of what its varied components do. Armed with this knowledge you will have a great idea of what you are seeing at when next you go to buy a computer.
The most complex part of the computer is the flat circuit board (called the motherboard) into which most of the other devices within the computer are plugged. We'll start by inspecting what components are found on the motherboard and what part that they play in the execution of your computer.
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There are a estimate of processing chips that are hard wired onto your motherboard. One of these is the Bios chip (basic input production system) which contains the permanent memory that contains the instructions that tell your computer how to start up and load the operating system. The facts contained within the Bios chip can be updated to correctly reflect the setup of your computer by running a special agenda contained within the chip when you first start the computer. This agenda is accessed by pressing a special key aggregate (usually just the delete key) just after the computer first starts up. Some motherboards have a second Bios chip to supply added protection against the article of the Bios memory getting corrupted. Most contemporary Bios chips also allow you to change the programs stored in the chip by running a special program. This is known as flashing the Bios.
One chip on the motherboard needs to run permanently even when your computer is off. For this conjecture this chip is powered by a battery that you will also find on the motherboard. This chip is the Rtc chip (real time clock) which keeps track of the current date and time.
The two biggest chips that you will find hard wired to your motherboard are known as the north bridge and south bridge chips. The north bridge chip is responsibe for controlling the central processing unit and all of the random way memory that are plugged into your motherboard. The south bridge chip controls most of the other devices on the motherboard such as the Pci bus which has most of the peripheral devices either built into the board and hence permanently related or which can be plugged into the varied "slots" that can be found along the back edge of the motherboard. Computer motherboard manufacturers have recently been working on redesigning the recipe that these two chips use to spin with one someone else as the addition speed of the many other components within the theory mean that this has rapidly approached the point of becoming the bottleneck in communications within your computer. It is these two chips which in the middle of them operate the communications in the middle of all of the other components in your system.
These days there are regularly a estimate of computer sub-systems built into the motherboard which in the early computers had to be plugged in separately. In the earliest computers even the Rtc chip had to be installed via a plug in card. Today the Eide hard disk controller, the floppy drive controller, serial port controller, parallel port controller, and Usb port (universal serial port) controllers are approximately all the time built into the motherboard and run off of the Pci bus that is controlled by the south bridge chip. Some computers even have integrated sound or networking and while this adds to the cost of the motherboard and makes upgrading more difficult this may be the ideal solution for a cheap firm system. Other controllers are also occasionally integrated into motherboards eg. Scsi controller.
Also to be found on the motherboard are a estimate of sockets and slots that allow you to plug other components into the motherboard in order to change it into a unblemished computer. Attached to the north bridge are the processor slot or socket where the Cpu chip is plugged in as well as the memory sockets where the main memory gets plugged in. The form of these sockets (as well as the programming incorporated into the varied chips on the motherboard) will rule the type and speed of the processor and memory that can be used with this motherboard.
Attached to the south bridge are the main slots along the back of the computer where the varied other devices get plugged in. In early computers these slots consisted mostly (or entirely) of 8 bit or 16 bit Isa slots with perhaps one slot extended to the Vesa proper to take the graphics card. Some 386 computers straight through early pentium systems also had a 32 bit version of the Isa slot called an Eisa slot. More contemporary computers use Pci slots (mostly the 32 bit range but a longer 64 bit version also exists). They may also have a single Agp slot that is designed to take the graphics card. Ultimately there will be a estimate of sockets on the motherboard providing the means whereby the integrated controllers previously mentioned can spin with their related devices.
As you can see from the above, the motherboards that you find in distinct computers can vary quite significantly from one someone else in terms of the options supplied on the board, the slots available to plug other components into the board, and even in the means and speed at which the varied components on the board spin with one another. The option of which motherboard that will be used in a given computer can dramatically corollary the speed of the computer as well as determining what other parts can be incorporated into the computer.
What's in the Box - The Motherboard
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