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To know the motherboards, magazines and regular hardware publications are a good source. However, if you are a computer enthusiast then you can join the chat forums on the Net and learn more about hardware. Having been acquainted with the latest information on motherboard, the choice of selecting motherboard could be easier. Going by the standards, following are some of the important points, which should be given due consideration before purchasing a motherboard: There are two broad categories of motherboard designs available — AT and ATX. The ATX is an industry-wide open specification for a PC motherboard, whereas the earlier standard was AT. Thus normally what we buy is the AT motherboard, which is not just the older style, but also lacks in performance as compared to the ATX motherboard. ATX improves the motherboard design by taking the small AT motherboard that has been an industry standard in the past and rotating by 90 degrees the layout of the microprocessor and expansion slot. ATX motherboards are bigger in size and allow space for more full-length add-in card. Unlike AT motherboard, in the ATX motherboard, less cables are required as COM ports, USB ports and LPT port are all built in on the motherboard and are not connected through a connector, which is normally being done in case of an AT motherboard. Moreover the power supply also has a side-mounted fan, allowing direct cooling of the processor and also the cards, making a secondary fan unnecessary. Today you will find only the ATX motherboard in all major branded computers including, Compaq, IBM, Apple. The other important thing to look for in the motherboard is the CPU socket though this is not the real problem point. The only thing to note here is the lever on a ZIF socket, but this will probably not be opened often. Another point of consideration is SIMM slots. You must take a close look at the small metal clips that hold SIMMs in. There are a few different kinds available in various motherboards: plastic, thin metal and firm metal. Obviously, firm ones are better because they are easier to install. They slide out of place for the SIMM then click into place as the SIMM gets inserted all the way. Another important point to be considered is the drive connectors. Here it best suits to have a small plastic border around the pins, which fits around the connector. This border is just the right size for the connector. Though this is available in some of the processor, yet is not a limiting factor for a good motherboard. Jumpers constitute another main consideration of the motherboard. It is the jumpers, which makes the motherboard’s future up gradable and also overclocked. Thus, jumpers are used to control the CPU clock speed, bus speed, and CPU voltage. Jumpers are most common, although some boards use DIP switches, while the newest are jumperless and use a system called Softmenu to control the settings using software. Jumperless systems though are easiest to deal with, yet one may come across some software problems occasionally. Moreover, in case you prefer to over clock motherboard then also the jumperless motherboard may put some problem, at least to amateurs. Other features, though not related to the design but to the capacity of the motherboard, are also important to consider. First of all it is now very important to go for a motherboard, which has a front side bus of 133 MHz rather than the normal one of 100 MHz, that used to be the norm earlier for the Pentium processors. Since now all newer Pentium III processors support 133 MHz FSB, it is necessary that the motherboard supports this speed even if you are not buying top-of-the-line Pentium III processor. Moreover, it should also support PC 133 SDRAM DIMMs with space for memory expansion. Since the hardware technology is in for a rapid change thus you should look for a motherboard that supports Ultra ATA/100. Other desirable supported features of a quality motherboard are 4 USB slots and 4x AGP. There is an increasing demand for an extra PCI slots on the motherboard. So you must also check for spare PCI slots on the motherboard. Normally PCI-slots get filled up soon and then you land up in trouble wishing for more PCI slots. If you plan to build a home network later, you should be concerned more about PCI slots as your internal modem; sound card and a PCI video card will already consume 3 slots. If the motherboard has only 4 slots, then the future is limited vis-a-vis a TV card, or a Network card, or possibly another IDE controller card. All of these come in PCI. So it’s best to go with 5 PCI slots or more. A user may prefer not to choose the motherboard, which has the features of the previous generation like support for only PC100 SDRAM DIMMs, Ultra ATA/66, 2 USB etc. Remember, these old generation motherboards will soon find a place in the history and if the buyer bases his choice on it, then he would probably have an antique item in the time to come. Lastly, before choosing
make sure that it is upgradable to future needs and supports the future
technologies. |
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