Super I/O Chips

Super I/O Chips

Another major chip seen on many PC motherboards is called the Super I/O chip. This chip normally integrates devices formerly found on separate expansion cards in older systems. On the newer motherboard the function of the I/O is performed by the main chipset. Most Super I/O chips contain, at a minimum, the following components:

§  Floppy controller

§  Dual serial port controllers

§  Parallel port controller

Chipset

Chipsets

The chipset is the main component of a motherboard. The chipset contains the processor bus interface, which is called front-side bus (FSB), memory controllers, bus controllers, I/O controllers, and many more. The processor cannot talk to the memory, adapter boards, devices, and so on without going through the chipset. Two boards with the same chipsets are functionally same. System with slower processor but better chipset can perform better then a system with faster processor The chipset is the main hub and central nervous system of the PC. If you think of the processor as the brain, the chipset is the spine and central nervous system.

Chipset determines: -

§  What type of processor you can fit on the motherboard?

§  How fast the buses will run?

§  What type, speed and amount of memory you can use?