Technibble » Brian G http://www.technibble.com A Resource for Computer Repair Technicians & to get PC tech support help. Sat, 21 Nov 2009 03:23:10 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.4 en hourly 1 Modern Motherboards: Out with the old and in with the “new” new http://www.technibble.com/modern-motherboards-out-with-the-old-and-in-with-the-new-new/ http://www.technibble.com/modern-motherboards-out-with-the-old-and-in-with-the-new-new/#comments Tue, 10 Apr 2007 14:16:22 +0000 Brian G http://www.technibble.com/modern-motherboards-out-with-the-old-and-in-with-the-new-new/ © Technibble - A Resource for Computer Technicians to start or improve their computer business
To get started with your own computer business, check out our Computer Business Kit. If you want to learn how to repair laptops, check out these narrated, high definition videos. These would pay for themselves in 1 repair job.

Modern Motherboards: Out with the old and in with the “new” new

]]> In the real world, I work as a data and systems architect. A client surprised me this week by asking for a “10 year architecture plan” to include detailed hardware specifications. I found this interesting as we usually don’t venture more than five years into the future and in a scenario like this will specify the latest and greatest in server technology making sure the hardware has room for expansion. We can usually specify three to five years but without a crystal ball it’s difficult to know or even guess where processors, storage and especially motherboard technology will be ten years from now.

As home users we have some of the same issues in choosing hardware. Most of us can’t afford to lease our home computers and those of us who build our own (an expensive yet rewarding compulsion I picked up somewhere between the Pentium 2 and 3) find ourselves facing Moore’s law.
Technology is evolving ever faster in computer hardware and a choice made today to upgrade may result in regret a couple of months later. The competition between AMD and Intel has the evolution of the processor and therefore the evolution of the processor form factor racing forward faster than ever before. The Pentium 3 and AMD K-7 chips brought speed to home users which had lagged behind the increases made in storage and user interfaces. The bottleneck in those days was found all over the motherboards, from the RAM all the way to the PCI bus, (if you can remember ISA then you can probably relate…)
As long as the processor architecture doesn’t change, we can always swap out the chip if the motherboard allows it. Multi-core processors, high efficiency processors and 4-5 GHz chips are either here now or right around the corner. The performance gains, energy savings and new features make the decision to upgrade a difficult one to resist. My recent decision to replace an older Pentium 4 machine with a core duo one actually surprised me when I researched the various motherboard options and found features I had been reading about as “just around the corner” for quite a while were now appearing in the silicon such as pci-express, DDR-2 and 64bit support among other goodies. The already fast pace of hardware evolution gave way to a flood of new standards meant to open the data bandwidth of the system to approach that of the latest processors.
The PC and yes, even the Mac is actually a series of inter-dependant devices held together by the motherboard. Motherboards perform the critical role of routing data between the system components, translating control and data from peripherals such as your keyboard and mouse, reading and writing data between temporary storage such as RAM to permanent storage such as hard drives, CD /DVD drives and the soon to be flash based drives in addition to translating digital to analog or vice versa as needed. Some motherboards are true “all in one” devices with video, audio and networking peripherals built in.

Form Factors
Motherboards come in different shapes and sizes, sometimes a functional requirement and sometimes the all too common “proprietary format” specified by manufacturers for reasons we won’t bother with here. At one time or another you’ve heard of form factors which include, AT, ATX, BTX, Mini-ATX and even Nano-ATX. The form factor determines the overall dimensions of the board, the placement of components, especially external connections and the power supply pin-out and connector type. Your typical system administrator will probably have long and technical arguments for why a certain form factor, (usually one of the many I did not list) is better. For the purposes of building or upgrading your system the best is one that fits the case you are using or plan to use, supports the technology you need and fits your budget. The most common form factors at this time are ATX, Mini-AX and Nano-ATX. As you might guess; the boards range in size with ATX being the largest, Mini-ATX smaller and Nano-ATX the smallest. Nano-ATX boards are used for specialty computers such as car PCs. ATX also refers to the power supply standard used in the latest boards which includes additional pins, SATA power connectors and often special connectors for high power graphics cards.
The Expansion Bus
The rectangular card slot connections which line the back-side of the motherboard provide the expansion bus. For years the most common bus types were AGP, (used for graphics) and PCI, (used for everything else, some graphics cards and anything not ISA but let’s skip ancient history). The importance of the various bus standard lies squarely in the amount of data bandwidth each one is capable of. The latest in bus technology is the PCI-express standard. Think of a PCI slot as a multi-lane highway capable of two-way traffic, traffic backups and so on. Each bus type has certain number of lanes and a “speed limit” for them. PCI-Express or “PCIe” is evolving even as you read this from version 1.1 to version 2.0 which will represent a doubling of its speed limit. PCIe 1.1 transfers data at 250 MB/s in each direction per lane. With 32 lanes available, PCIe has a theoretical transfer capability of 8 GB/s in each direction. The standard bandwidth figure for PCIe v1.1 is given as 2.5 GB/s. PCIe v2.0 will be 5 GB/s. For comparison, just one of the lanes in a PCIe bus is close to 2 times faster than the old PCI standard. 8 PCIe lanes are equal to the fastest AGP bus. PCIe bus connections come in different sizes which range from 1x, 2x, 4x, 8x and 16x. The important thing is to check that your desired PCIe card has the required matching PCIe slot in the correct dimension. PCIe slots support vast improvements in the way in which data is communicated by means of layers in the data protocol. These allow even higher bus rates in future versions and a capability called “linking”. An even number of PCIe slots can be “linked” given specific support for linking built into the motherboard. This link allows us to combine 2 or more graphics cards for very high performance applications. As always, gamers and the design community are driving these capabilities. Depending on the graphics card vendor this is referred to as “SLI” or “Crossfire” capability.

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To get started with your own computer business, check out our Computer Business Kit. If you want to learn how to repair laptops, check out these narrated, high definition videos. These would pay for themselves in 1 repair job.

Modern Motherboards: Out with the old and in with the “new” new

]]> http://www.technibble.com/modern-motherboards-out-with-the-old-and-in-with-the-new-new/feed/ 2 How to Replace a Power Supply (and buy a good one) http://www.technibble.com/how-to-replace-a-power-supply-and-buy-a-good-one/ http://www.technibble.com/how-to-replace-a-power-supply-and-buy-a-good-one/#comments Mon, 02 Apr 2007 16:34:07 +0000 Brian G http://www.technibble.com/how-to-replace-a-power-supply-and-buy-a-good-one/ © Technibble - A Resource for Computer Technicians to start or improve their computer business
To get started with your own computer business, check out our Computer Business Kit. If you want to learn how to repair laptops, check out these narrated, high definition videos. These would pay for themselves in 1 repair job.

How to Replace a Power Supply (and buy a good one)

]]> Once upon a time there lived a PC who killed video cards. He was a nice, quiet PC, middle aged and had always performed his duties well. At some point he changed though. He went through several video cards without regard to brand or price and eventually a lengthy investigation uncovered the defect in him responsible. It was his power supply…..

I’ve built a dozen computers over the years and up until then I’d never given much thought to the hunk of grey metal sitting anonymously in the various cases I used. In the case of my murderous friend, the trouble did not register with me until I began tracking down possible causes and realized I had moved the motherboard into a new case. Ruling out the possibility my motherboard just didn’t like its new home the only variable left was the included power supply. For the first time in my PC building career I found myself purchasing one as a separate component.
As the cost of energy rises and the debates over global warming rage the potential cost of running one or several computers has become something to consider. I’ve already taken steps to reduce my monthly energy bill outside the home office and recently began to research the possible savings in making changes to my home network. Things such as turning on hibernation, setting drives to sleep and only leaving computers powered on I need have made a noticeable difference. While pricing components for a future project involving replacing some of my older hardware with more efficient components I was surprised to find that power supplies have evolved. There are “high efficiency” models, “fan-less / silent” models and given the need for cleaner, tighter power among the components available today, the anonymous power supply has become as well-designed as the rest of the computer.
Whether replacing a power supply out of necessity due to failure or an upgrade in components requiring a different design or a desire for reduced noise and power consumption, the process is no longer quite a simple as it once was. Power supplies are now rated for specific processor brand / type and the motherboards connections. The ATX 1.3 standard is being replaced by ATX 12V 2.0 which features a 24 pin mobo connector in place of the former 20 pin and specialized connections for SATA, PCI-express and an optional 4-pin molex for drives. The best point of reference is your motherboards manual or on-line documentation and if you find yourself replacing failed ATX 1.3 supply, you may want to consider purchasing one of the newer standard ones along with an adaptor cable in order to save money on future upgrades. Toms Hardware has a very well-written stress test review of quite a few power supplies, including a couple of high-efficiency models and wattage ratings from low to outrageously high. Noise and efficiency ratings are also given in the review. These are the variables you’ll want to take into account in order to get a power supply which meets your power / noise preferences and the requirements of your motherboard and components. Wattage should be calculated to be what your components need plus a little headroom for future upgrades. (Your existing unit should have this printed on the back label and upgraded components also provide power requirements in the documentation or on the box). If your computer only requires 300 watts putting a 1000 watt supply in is a waste of money and electricity. If you are working with a manufactured PC from Dell, Compaq / HP and so on you should either compare the existing unit to available replacements or purchase a replacement from the vendor as these sometimes have specialized connections outside the ATX standard.

Things to consider when purchasing a new power supply:

  • Motherboard connection type
  • Specialized units, (Dell, Compaq / HP and others)
  • Warranty (You may void it by replacing a factory supply on your own)
  • Wattage needed (look at the back of your existing supply)
  • Noise level
  • Desired power efficiency

© Technibble - A Resource for Computer Technicians to start or improve their computer business
To get started with your own computer business, check out our Computer Business Kit. If you want to learn how to repair laptops, check out these narrated, high definition videos. These would pay for themselves in 1 repair job.

How to Replace a Power Supply (and buy a good one)

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