View and vote on the article here: This you should know when: Buying a mainboard
This you should know when: Buying a mainboard| Category | | | Summary | | Think of your PC as a car: What a chassis is for an automobile - with motor, wheels and chairs installed - is what a mainboard is for a PC. Any hardware (like a processor, memory or graphics card) is plugged into the mainboard. Even the mouse and keyboard |
| | Body | Without a motherboard, you can do nothing with a computer except use it as a shelf or footrest. Every single component of a PC is connected to the motherboard. Since components are interchangeable, a PC can be put together based on individual needs and desires. However, while the different types of sockets and chipsets are sometimes confusing to keep straight, your choice of socket determines what the performance and extensibility of your system is. Both Intel and AMD offer different sockets.
Intel Sockets:
When you buy a desktop-computer with an Intel processor, it's most likely mounted to a modern socket 775 mainboard. The number stands for the amount of contacts on the CPU. Any new Intel CPU is going to be designed for this socket and most of the currently available modern Pentiums or Celerons are designed to be used with it. However, some older CPUs (like the Celeron-D) are not compatible with it and require the older socket 478. This is an outmoded socket since no new hardware is being designed for it,thereby making it difficult, if not impossible, to upgrade such a system.
AMD Sockets:
Currently there are four different types of AMD sockets available. Socket A is the oldest available version and is designed to work with Duron and Sempron CPUs as well as Athlon XP CPUs up to the 3200+ (2.2 GHz). Anything faster will not work with a Socket A. Nowadays, AMD fully concentrates on their 64 bit processors (the Athlon 64 and Athlon FX). For these processors, you can choose between three sockets: Socket 940 only works with high-end Athlon FX processors and the Opteron (for servers). With a Socket 754, you can use a cheap Sempron or Athlon 64 CPU, but with a socket 939, you achieve the most flexibility: you can usse either an Athlon 64 or an Athlon FX, as well as other new models which have already been announced for this socket type.
Socket Conclusion:
When you buy a new PC, you should go for Socket 775 for Intel or Socket 939 for AMD. All other sockets are outdated, and the same goes for chipsets.
Socket supported processors
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Socket 478 | Intel | Celeron, Pentium-4, Pentium-4 EE
Socket 775 | Intel | Celeron 3x, Pentium 5x, Pentium-4 EE
Socket A | AMD | Duron, Sempron, Athlon-XP
Socket 754 | AMD | Sempron, Athlon-64
Socket 939 | AMD | Sempron, Athlon-64, Athlon-FX
Socket 940 | AMD | Athlon-FX, Opteron
Chipsets:
The integrated chipset determines the stability, performance and features of a PC, and is one of the central elements of any motherboard. It affects how fast the memory can be, which graphic interface is used (AGP or PCI-Express), and which processors are supported. For the majority of users, extensibility is less important than stability and performance. The most modern board is good for nothing when it constantly crashes.
The performance of different boards with the same chipset is almost equal - even by tweaking things, only a few percentage points will be gained at most.
New features:
With a modern chipset, you have to say goodbye to some old friends. The PCI Bus is replaced by PCI-Express. The space that was full of IDE drive cables has to make room for the faster and slimmer Serial-ATA. There is also an improvement in security. New processors support the so-called "No-Execution-Bit" (NX-Bit), which prevents calculation of malicious code produced by viruses and the like. Some boards (like Nvidia's Nforce 4) even have an integrated hardware firewall.
Chipsets for Intel processors:
The non plus ultra on the current market for Intel are the Intel 925X/XE and the Intel 915 series for Celeron and Pentium 4 CPUs. Additionally, there is the VIA PT880, which is not very widespread. Most manufacturers combine the Intel chipsets with the Socket 775, because there will be no new chipsets for the Socket 478. You can also find older Intel 865 and 875 enforced mainboards on the shelves. However, since they are not really cheaper then the current generation chipsets, there is no reason to buy them, apart from sticking to the AGP standard (most modern boards have completely dropped their AGP support in favor of PCI-Express).
Chipset Processor Socket
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Intel 925XE | P4, P4-EE, Celeron D | 775
Intel 925X | P4, P4 EE, Celeron D | 775
Intel 915P | P4, Celeron, Celeron D | 775, 478
Intel 875 | P4, Celeron, Celeron D | 478
Intel 865 | P4, Celeron, Celeron D | 478
Chipsets for AMD Processors:
There are multiple modern chipsets for AMD systems available. The most interesting ones are Nvidia's Nforce4 chipset, VIA's K8T890 or ATI's RX480. Only those chipsets support graphics cards with a PCI-Express interface. Special variants, like the Nforce4 SLI, allow you to couple two graphics cards together to boost your gaming performance.
Chipset Processor Socket
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Nvidia Nforce4 SLI | A64, Athlon FX | 939
Nvidia Nforce4 Ultra | A64, Athlon FX | 939
Nvidia Nforce4 | A64, Athlon FX, Sempron | 939, 754
Nvidia Nforce 3 Ultra | A64, Athlon FX, Sempron | 939
Nvidia Nforce 3-250 | A64, Athlon FX, Sempron | 754
Nvidia Nforce 2 | Athlon-XP, Duron, Sempron | So-A
VIA K8T890 | A64, Athlon FX | 939
VIA K8T800 Pro | A64, Athlon FX | 939
SIS 760 GX | A64, Athlon FX, Sempron | 939, 754
ATI RX480 | A64, Athlon FX, Sempron | 939, 754
Onboard Components:
Since motherboard chips are getting physically smaller and smaller, there is now more space for additional components. Newer boards now integrate sound, disc controllers, graphics or networking chips. This lowers the prices for all-in-one solutions.
When the first integrated sound chips were invented, they were not reallly a quality component. However, nowadays motherboards deliver sound quality up to eight channels, occasionally digital. This should be enough for close to any customer. However, when it comes down to integrated graphics chips, names that sound good (like "Intel Extreme" or "Radeon IGP 900") do not necessarily equal quality. Although these chips support the DirectX9 standard, they totally fail to deliver on most games. High resolution and fluid gameplay is only achievable by getting an extra graphics card. This uses a tremendous amount of power, and standard power supplies often do not deliver enough power, or lack the necessary wires.
Very few new motherboards do not have a RAID controller. By connecting two or more hard drives to a RAID controller you have a lot of options:
- You can gain extra speed, because the file is split up (striped) on all mounted hard drives and one file can be read simultaneously by multiple heads. However, malfunction of one hard drive will result in total data loss, although the other connected drives are physically unaffected and still remain functional.
- You could improve security and choose the mirror method. You have exactly the same data on two or more hard drives and if one fails, the other(s) can still be accessed, resulting in ultimate data security. However, there is no real speed advantage in this method, and furthermore, you can only use half of your entire available disk space.
- If you can afford it, you can mix the above principles.
Many motherboards support Gigabit LAN, which (obviously) makes it possible to transfer data up to ten times faster than on usual 100 Megabit LANs. However, on most VIA chipsets, the performance is slow, due to the slower PCI interface. Only the VIA K8T800 can handle the entire possible data transfer.
Choices to make:
Motherboards differ only minimally from each other in terms of performance. That's why many manufacturers try to enhance their bundle with special features. Some address case modders with colored boards or slots, while others offer built-in overclocking utilities, sensors or extra interfaces. So called "OEM" boards usually lack these types features, since they are intended not for stores but for being put into all-in-one systems (however, many retailers often sell OEM products to costumers who want a machine as cheaply as possible).
A matter of form:
If each manufacturer designed motherboards in different sizes, you would never know if that particular board fits into your case. The so-called "form factor" regulates the size of the board as well as the arrangement of elements and the position of the screw-holes. For desktop computers, there are currently two popular standards: the rectangular ATX boards and the square Micro-ATX boards (designed for small cases). Intel's new BTX standard will enable manufacturers to make especially quiet PCs.
Form factor mm
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AT | 305 x 279 - 330
ATX | 305 x 244
Mini-ATX | 284 x 208
Micro-ATX | 244 x 244
BTX | 325 x 267
Micro-BTX | 264 x 267
Pico-BTX | 203 x 267
Mini-ITX | 170 x 170
Nano-ITX | 120 x 120
Conclusion:
We are in a time of technological change (again) and many people will have to throw away some of their old (maybe even "beloved") hardware sooner or later. New standards, new interfaces, and most importantly, the lack of new processors for old sockets, will force many users into buying a newer motherboard. This is especially true when it comes to upgrading a graphics card, because AGP is a dying standard, and it's hard to get new graphics cards that do not support PCI-Express. At the same time, OEM products are getting cheaper and cheaper while their overall performance and stability has grown. If you aren't a gamer, you can go for an all-in-one solutions with no worries. If you are a gamer, add a new board and chipset to your holiday wish list.
Resources:
Information and tables taken from:
http://www.chip.de/artikel/c1_artikel_14818057.html (German)
Additional Information taken from:
http://www.amd.com
http://www.viaarena.com
http://www.intel.com
http://www.tomshardware.de (German)
Information on RAID Systems taken from:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redundant_array_of_independent_disks
and
http://www.hardoverclock.org/html/articles/raid/raid_1.htm (German, best viewed with IE ;) ) |
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This article was imported from zZine. (original author: gmw)
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