Motherboards - Extra Features & Expansion Slots

Many motherboards now include features onboard that were times only available as expansion cards to be bought separately. A typical motherboard will now include stereo sound capabilities, a 10/100 LAN connection, & a few USB.0 ports on the back panel connection. Depending on the budget & needs of the finish user, lots of motherboards may also include other convenient features such as integrated Firewire ports, VGA connections, & onboard RAID controllers.

Motherboards Additional Features

Although lots of these things may be added later with expansion cards, in the event you know you need them upfront, a little miniscule small little bit of installation hassle & expense can be eliminated by finding a board with everything you need included. That said; there are not lots of choices of onboard parts, so it is a case of take it or leave it. For example, you may need stereo sound included, but find most motherboards offer channel, where you would prefer 8 channel. In that case, it could be a pleasant thing that motherboards include expansion slots to add the sound card of your choice.

Expansion Slots

A motherboard usually provides at least slot for the installation of a graphics card & a few slots for expanding the capabilities of the technique in other areas.

Graphics cards are available in PCI, AGP, & now PCI Express formats, & matching a motherboard to the appropriate card is a key step. Most motherboards released over the past few years include an AGP slot,

& the new wave of motherboards is now beginning to feature PCI Express slots for graphics card installation.

PCI slots are found on most motherboards, but are

much slower than AGP & PCI Express slots, so they are not the optimal choice for graphics. ATX motherboards may usually feature to PCI slots, & although they could be used for secondary display graphics cards, more common applications include sound cards, network cards, RAID controllers, TV tuners, modems, & USB/Firewire controllers. Thinking about that lots of these things are now included onboard, having multiple PCI slots is not as important as it was times.