Mother chart

The mother chart ( motherboard in English) is a Printed circuit being used to inter-connect all the components of a Micro-ordinateur. As it makes it possible the various parts of a microcomputer to communicate between them, the mother chart is, in a certain way, the Nervous system of the microcomputer.

Elements of the mother chart

A typical mother chart contains the following elements:
  • one or more connectors of power supply: these connectors provide the mother chart in electricity;
  • the clock of the computer: it is it which gives rhythm the speed of execution of the instructions of the Microprocesseur;
  • CMOS: a small memory which stores certain important information (like the configuration of the computer, the date and the hour) even when the computer is not supplied with electricity;
  • the Battery of the CMOS: it provides electricity necessary to the operation of the CMOS;
  • BIOS: small a program recorded in a chip EEPROM, support of a Read-only memory (ROMANIAN), which manages the interface of low level between the Micro-processeur and some peripheral and which carries out the instructions of the master boot record during the starting of the microcomputer;
  • the support of the microprocessor (often called socket): it is about a receptacle which receives the microprocessor and connects it to the remainder of the microcomputer;
  • connectors of the Random access memory (memory slot in English) 2,3 or 4 on the common mother charts;
  • the Chipset: a electronic Circuit which manages the transfers of information between the various components of the computer (microprocessor, random access memory, Hard drive, etc…) ;
  • the drunk system (also called drunk intern or Side Face Drunk (FSB) in English): he connects the microprocessor to the chipset;
  • the bus report connects the chipset to the random access memory;
  • the bus of extension (also called drunk inputs/outputs): it connects the microprocessor to the connectors of input/output and the connectors of extension;
  • the connectors of input/output which generally respect the standard PC 99: these connectors include
    • the ports series for the connection of old peripherals,
    • the parallel ports for connection, inter alia, of old women Imprimante S,
    • the ports USB (Universal Serial Bus) for the connection of recent peripherals,
    • the connectors RJ45 for connection to a Data-processing network,
    • the connectors VGA for the connection of a Moniteur of computer,
    • the connectors IDE or Serial ATA I or II for the connection of peripherals of storage like the hard drives;
    • the connectors audios for the connection of apparatuses audios like Loudspeaker S or a Microphonous ;
  • connectors of extension: they are receptacles being able to accommodate expander cards (these charts are used to add functionalities or to increase the performance of a microcomputer, for example a Graphics card can be added to a computer to improve quality of posting on the monitor). These ports are called ports NCV (Peripheral Component Interconnect) and on more recent mother charts PCI Express 1X or 16X.

With the evolution of the computers, more and more of functionalities were integrated into the mother chart, like electronic circuits allowing the management of video (IGP for Integrated Graphic Processor), of the sound, the networks (10/100 Mbps even 1Gbps for recent mother charts) or hard drives evolved/moved, thus allowing to avoid the addition of expander cards tiresome to parameterize.

It should be noted that there exist mother charts biprocessors having two supports of microprocessor (sockets), which makes it possible to plug in two physically distinct microprocessors to them (in opposition to the processors dual-core).

Manufacturers

Several manufacturers share the market of the mother charts such as Abit, Albatron, Aopen, Asrock, ASUS, ATI, Biostar, Chaintech, DFI, Elite, Epox, Foxconn, Gigabyte Technology, Intel, MSI, NVIDIA, QDI, Sapphire, Soltek, Super Microphone, Tyan, Via.

Some conceive and manufacture one or more components of the mother chart while others assemble the elements that partners conceived and manufactured.

Types of mother charts

The majority of the mother charts for PC sold after 2001, can be classified in 2 groups:

  • the mother charts intended for the processors Intel:

    • Socket 478 : Pentium 4, Celeron,
    • Socket 775: Pentium 4, Celeron, Pentium D (dual-core), Core 2 Duet.
    • Socket 604 : Xeon DP

Formats of mother charts

With the passing of years, several standards were essential, proposing their derivatives:
  • 1984 AT: 305 X 305 mm (IBM)
    • Baby AT: 216 X 330 mm

  • 1995 ATX : 305 X 244 mm (Intel)

    • MicroATX: 244 X 244 mm
    • FlexATX: 229 X 191 mm
    • MiniATX: 284 X 208 mm

  • 2001 ITX : 215 X 195 mm (VIA)

    • MiniITX: 170 X 170 mm
    • NanoITX: 120 X 120 mm
    • PicoITX: 100 X 72 mm

  • 2005 BTX : 325 X 267 mm (Intel)

    • MicroBTX: 264 X 267 mm
    • PicoBTX: 203 X 267 mm

  • 2007 DTX : 248 X 203 mm (AMD)

    • minis-DTX: 170 X 203 mm

See too

Related article

Simple: Motherboard

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