A+ Hardware Service Technician: Computer Hardware, System Boards, and Storage Devices

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System Board Overview

The system board, also referred to as the “main board” or “motherboard” contains all of the elements that are central to the operation of the computer including the CPU, expansion slots, memory, and components which connect to other devices.

System Board Components

The CPU (Central Processing Unit) is the central chip to the operation of the computer. The CPU processes the instructions from the software. A CPU can be from several different manufacturers, examples include a Pentium II, an AMD Athlon, or a PowerPC. CPU speeds are measured in Megahertz. The higher the Megahertz, the faster the chip (generally speaking, CPUs are also measured in how many instructions per second it can perform and so a chip with a lower MHz could work much faster than one with a higher MHz, though on the Intel-compatible side of computing, the higher the MHz number, the faster the chip). For example, a Pentium III running at 800 MHz is faster than a Pentium III running at 700 MHz.

Newer chips are measured in GHz (Gigahertz), which is simply 1000 MHz. A 1.2 GHz chip is 1,200 MHz.

The expansion bus allows the computer to be upgraded using different modules. Expansion buses are made up with copper slots where a circuit board can plug into it. The motherboard contains a bus clock which controls how fast information flows to the expansion boards and back.

Memory, or more specifically RAM (Random Access Memory), is the place for storages of software, computer instructions, and operations while the computer is operating. RAM is a very fast storage location; though it loses all of its information with a loss of power.

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