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The motherboard is the most important part in the computer. It is also one of the parts most often compared, critiqued, and reviewed. Often, though, on the internet, you'll find reviews and debates over which board is best or which chipset is best, and the casual user gets left in the dust. We will try to explain what's going on and what it all means. Most everyone knows
that the motherboard is the most important component of your computer.
Every other component, at some point, connects to the motherboard. Also,
the motherboard controls what you can and cannot put into your computer
later on down the road. Want to upgrade you RAM? Well, you first have to
check to see what types your motherboard will take, and whether it can
support that much memory. Want that new TNT2 video card? Well, does your
motherboard have AGP? Get the point? If you choose the wrong motherboard
in the beginning, you may find yourself having to buy another down the
road to support some other upgrade. Today's motherboards are a lot
different than the one's in the 486 days. If you are used to these older
systems, you need to get up to speed with the latest boards. Where you
needed an IDE controller card the connectors are now built right on.
Where USB was optional, now every board has it. Some boards go all the
way, offering built on SCSI controllers, 10/100 Ethernet support,
onboard video and sound, etc. Buying a motherboard is a trade-off. You
need to know what you want and then pick that board which has the best
combination of gizmos for you. |
