2. ©2002 TechRepublic, Inc. www.techrepublic.com. All rights reserved. Learn to identify common ATX motherboard components Created by: Mike Walton Web Editor, Support Republic From the original article by Van Glick

3. ©2002 TechRepublic, Inc. www.techrepublic.com. All rights reserved. Introduction Although different motherboard designs abound, all ATX form factor motherboards have common components that you should recognize.

4. ©2002 TechRepublic, Inc. www.techrepublic.com. All rights reserved. Socket 370 motherboard I/O Ports AGP Slot PCI Slots CPU Interface RAM Memory Slots

5. ©2002 TechRepublic, Inc. www.techrepublic.com. All rights reserved. Slot 1 motherboard I/O Ports PCI Slots CPU Interface RAM Memory Slots

6. ©2002 TechRepublic, Inc. www.techrepublic.com. All rights reserved. Power supply fans the CPU The power-supply cooling fan blows directly on the Slot 1 CPU to aid in cooling the CPU and other components.

7. ©2002 TechRepublic, Inc. www.techrepublic.com. All rights reserved. Onboard sound is common This is a built-in sound chip. Most are clearly marked for easy identification.

8. ©2002 TechRepublic, Inc. www.techrepublic.com. All rights reserved. Some boards pair chips and slots Some boards have built-in video and an AGP slot allowing you to add a separate video card.

9. ©2002 TechRepublic, Inc. www.techrepublic.com. All rights reserved. Floppy and IDE jacks Most motherboards have one floppy drive controller with a 34-pin male jack. IDE drive controllers are similar to floppy controllers but have either 39 or 40 pins. You usually have two of them.

10. ©2002 TechRepublic, Inc. www.techrepublic.com. All rights reserved. RAM a little memory in ATX motherboards use 168-pin DIMM or 184- pin RIMM RAM chips. This shows 3 slots for 168-pin DIMMs. This shows four slots for 184-pin RIMMs.

11. ©2002 TechRepublic, Inc. www.techrepublic.com. All rights reserved. Questions