Jargon Buster : Motherboards

The first in the series of a few jargon busters i have planned :

1.MoBo : A MotherBoard

2. Northbridge : This is the chip that interconnects the CPU, RAM, video card, and the Southbridge. On Intel specific MoBos, it features the memory controller and can also be called as Memory Controller Hub ( MCH). The Northbridge also assigns the clock frequency of the processor and thus is the most important factor defining the overclocking potential of the MoBo.
It is generally plced on the upper half of the MoBO and hence the name Northbridge.

3.Southbridge : The I/O Contoller Hub ( ICH ) or Sothbridge connects all the input and output ports to the processor through the Northbridge. The PCI bus, PCI Express x1 x2 and x4 slots and all other peripheral buses connect through here. The Southbridge of the MoBO defines what onboard IDE controller, USB controller, sound card, and Ethernet adapter goes into the system.

4.eSATA : eSATA allows one to connect high-capacity eSATA capable external SATA drives to the computer. It performs as a regular SATA port, making it much quicker than USB and Fire Wire interfaces. The eSATA standard allows cable lengths upto 2 meters .

5.RAID : Redundant Array of Independent Disks ( RAID ) is a standard for storage devices that allows enhanced performance, reliability and fault tolerance compared to a single hard-disk, It requires the use of multiple disks that store data in 'stripped' RAID 0 or 'mirrored' RAID 1 modes depending on the configuration.

6.FSB : The Front Side Bus ( FSB ) is the bus that facilitates communication between the CPU and the Northbridge. Since the memory and all other peripherals are connected to the processor through the Northbridge it is the FSB that passes data to the CPU. Thus the speed of the FSB ( in MHz ) is the speed of the data transfer to and from the processor.

This is all for now...do keep in touch for the next in this series...
Cheers :) !!