Deck 7: Motherboards

Question 1

What are the maximum dimensions of a FlexATX motherboard?

A)9.6 × 9.6 inches
B)9 × 7.5 inches
C)9 × 7 inches
D)9 × 5.6 inches

Answer 1

B

Question 2

What are the usual dimensions of a microATX motherboard?

A)9.6 × 9.6 inches
B)12 × 9.6 inches
C)6.7 × 6.7 inches
D)4.7 × 4.7 inches

Answer 2

A

Question 3

Which term refers to industry-standardized shapes and layouts that enable motherboards to work with cases and power supplies?

A)Chipsets
B)Dongles
C)Expansion slots
D)Form factors

Answer 3

C

Question 4

The acronym RAID stands for _______________.

A)radical array for indirect drives
B)redundant array of independent disks
C)responsible application of interconnected disks
D)reliable application of independent data

Question 5

The motherboard mounts to the case via small connectors called _______________.

A)fire wires
B)standouts
C)nylon bolts
D)standoffs

Question 6

How many wires does a PCIe connection use for sending and receiving data?

A)One for sending and one for receiving
B)Eight for sending and 16 for receiving
C)16 for sending and eight for receiving
D)32 for sending and 32 for receiving

Question 7

What is the most common PCIe slot size used for video cards?

A)The 4-lane (×4) version
B)The 8-lane (×8) version
C)The 16-lane (×16) version
D)The 32-lane (×32) version

Question 8

Which port is considered to be a newer video port?

A)DIN
B)USB
C)HDMI
D)VGA

Question 9

What is the size of the Pico-ITX form factor?

A)3.8 × 2.8 inches
B)4.7 × 4.7 inches
C)6.7 × 6.7 inches
D)9.6 × 9.6 inches

Question 10

Each pair of wires between a PCIe controller and a device is called a(n) _______________.

A)bus
B)lane
C)bank
D)array

Question 11

Which ATX form factor is essentially no longer in use?

A)MicroATX
B)MacroATX
C)FlexATX
D)MiniATX

Question 12

Which ITX form factor competes head to head with the virtually identical microATX?

A)Mini-ITX
B)Micro-ITX
C)Pico-ITX
D)Nano-ITX

Question 13

The original PCI bus was _______________ wide and ran at 33 MHz.

A)8 bits
B)16 bits
C)32 bits
D)64 bits

Question 14

What is the size of the Nano-ITX form factor?

A)3.8 × 2.8 inches
B)4.7 × 4.7 inches
C)6.7 × 6.7 inches
D)9.6 × 9.6 inches

Question 15

Which form factor is the largest and the most popular of the three ITXs?

A)Mini-ITX
B)Micro-ITX
C)Pico-ITX
D)Nano-ITX

Question 16

A 200-MHz motherboard has its chipset chips all timed by a _______________ crystal.

A)100-MHz
B)200-MHz
C)100-GHz
D)200-GHz

Question 17

What is the latest, fastest, and most popular expansion bus in use today?

A)ISA
B)AGP
C)PCI
D)PCIe

Question 18

An AGP slot was a PCI slot; however, it had a direct connection to the _______________.

A)Southbridge
B)Northbridge
C)CMOS
D)CPU

Question 19

_______________, which are included on the motherboard, are lights that have positive and negative sides.

A)Power buttons
B)Reset buttons
C)LEDs
D)Chips

Question 20

What is the smallest motherboard version in the ATX standard?

A)AT
B)FlexATX
C)MicroATX
D)LPX

Question 21

Flashing the BIOS entails running a small command-line program to write a new BIOS in the flash _______________ chip.

A)Northbridge
B)Southbridge
C)ROM
D)RAM

Question 22

Most motherboards come with one _______________ jack for attaching a network cable.

Question 23

The now obsolete _______________ form factor was invented by IBM in the early 1980s and was the predominant form factor for motherboards through the mid-1990s.

Question 24

The _______________ form factor is distinct from AT in the lack of an AT keyboard port, replaced with a rear panel that has all necessary ports built in.

Question 25

Some of the features in proprietary systems are _______________-part of a motherboard that is separate from the main one but connected by a cable of some sort-and unique power connections.

Question 26

Older, original BIOS _______________ chips handled RAM.

Question 27

A brand new system failing due to manufacturing defects is often called a(n) _______________ failure.

A)burn-out
B)burn-in
C)ESD
D)system

Question 28

Around 2001, the chipset maker VIA Technologies started the process to create a small form factor (SFF) motherboard known as the _______________.

Question 29

A(n) _______________ defines the type of processor and RAM the motherboard requires and determines to a degree the built-in devices the motherboard supports, including the expansion slots.

Question 30

Which term refers to the millions of incorrectly formulated bulging capacitors that made it into computers in the mid-2000s and then failed at high rates?

A)Fatcat capacitors
B)Blistered capacitors
C)Lethargic capacitors
D)Distended capacitors

Question 31

Older, original BIOS _______________ chips handled some expansion devices and mass storage drives such as hard drives.

Question 32

RAID _______________ is the process of using two drives to hold the same data, which is good for safety, because if one drive dies, the other still has all of the data.

Question 33

_______________ motherboards enable companies to create systems that stand out from the generic ones.

Question 34

RAID _______________ refers to making two drives act as one drive by spreading data across them, which is good for speed.

Question 35

Modern CPUs incorporate the memory controller on the processor rather than locating it on the _______________.

Question 36

In addition to the Northbridge and the Southbridge chips, some motherboard manufacturers added (or still add) a third chip called the _______________ chip to handle expansion devices and mass storage drives especially in dealing with legacy devices.

Question 37

Modern motherboards are layered _______________, in which copper is etched onto a nonconductive material and then coated with some sort of epoxy for strength.

Question 38

A(n) _______________ determines the physical size of the motherboard as well as the general location of components and ports.

Question 39

The motherboard contains the wires-called _______________-that make up the buses of the system.

Question 40

A(n) _______________ symptom is the most difficult symptom to diagnose.

A)latency
B)catastrophic
C)ethereal
D)component

Question 41

In reference to point-to-point connections between devices and the motherboard, the _______________ rate describes the number of operations happening per second.

Question 42

For almost all expansion cards, their BIOS comes in the form of _______________-software support programs-loaded from an optical disc provided by the card manufacturer.

Question 43

If you need to upgrade the memory, it is best to know how many _______________ the new RAM interface supports, because performance is best when all channels are populated.

Question 44

A Blue Screen of Death (BSoD) displaying in the midst of heavy computing is an example of a(n) _______________ failure.

Question 45

A buggy device driver may cause _______________ symptoms.

Question 46

All motherboards come with a technical manual, better known as the _______________ book.

Question 47

Every device soldered to the motherboard is designed to run at the speed of the _______________.

Question 48

The last of the 32-bit versions of Windows had support for _______________ drivers, which were essentially drivers that had not gone through the Windows Certification Program (as it was called then) such that their software did not get a digital signature from Microsoft.

Question 49

Cases come in many sizes; _______________ and desktop models generally sit on the desk, beneath the monitor.

Question 50

Pretty much every chip in your computer has a(n) _______________ wire and needs to be pushed by a clock chip, including the chips on your expansion cards.

Question 51

If you plug a hard drive controller card into an expansion slot, it functions just as if it were built into the motherboard, albeit with one big difference: _______________.

Question 52

PCI made it into laptops in the specialty _______________ format.

Question 53

With a(n) _______________ failure, the computer just will not boot.

Question 54

_______________ the BIOS for a motherboard can fix a lot of system stability problems and provide better implementation of built-in technology.

Question 55

How many PCB layers are on a motherboard?

Question 56

To install drivers in Windows, you need _______________ permissions to install drivers.

Question 57

Shortly after inventing PCI, Intel presented a specialized, video-only version of PCI called the _______________.

Question 58

_______________ failure happens rarely and appears as flaky connections between a device and motherboard, or as intermittent problems.

Question 59

Optimally, an expansion card should always be in one of two places: in a computer or in a(n) _______________ bag.

Question 60

PCI Express is still PCI, but it uses a point-to-point _______________ connection instead of PCI's shared parallel communication.

Question 61

Why are chipset component chips relatively centrally located on the motherboard?

Question 62

Explain the reasoning behind proprietary motherboards.

Question 63

In the ATX form factor, what enhanced performance is provided by placing the RAM closer to the Northbridge and CPU as compared to AT boards?

Question 64

How do an expansion bus and its slots connect to the rest of the PC?

Question 65

Describe how motherboards support networking.

Question 66

What factors led to Intel's invention of the Accelerated Graphics Port (AGP) port?

Question 67

What hardware options do different chipsets support?

Question 68

In what order should you install a device and its device driver?

Question 69

How does the PCI standard fit into a laptop?

Question 70

Why do chipsets factor hugely in the purchase or recommendation of a particular motherboard?

Question 71

Briefly describe two ways to install a new device driver on Windows systems.

Question 72

How is the speed differential between an expansion slot and CPU controlled?

Question 73

Why are the connections and capabilities of a motherboard sometimes different from those that the chipset of the motherboard uses?

Question 74

In modern CPUs, what is the advantage incorporating the memory controller on the processor rather than locating it on the Northbridge?

Question 75

Describe how motherboards support video.

Question 76

List the four speed grades featured in the PCI-X 2.0 standard.

Question 77

Briefly describe PCIe.

Question 78

What are the benefits of ITX small form factor (SFF) motherboards?

Question 79

Briefly explain what is meant by the term daughter boards.

Question 80

How does a form factor relate to air movement in a case?