Republic of the Philippines

Department of Education
Region V
SCHOOLS DIVISION OF SORSOGON

LEARNING ACTIVITY SHEET

Quarter - 1

TECHNOLOGY AND LIVELIHOOD EDUCATION – Grade 9

Computer Systems Servicing

Student Name: ______________________ Grade & Section: _________________

Teacher: ___________________________ Date Submitted: _________________

I. INTRODUCTORY CONCEPT

In this module, you will learn different parts of computer motherboard and its function
explained one by one. There are multiple types of motherboards, designed to work with specific
types of processors and memory. And almost every major component (such as CPU, Memory,
expansion slots and more) that crucial for the functioning of the computer is attached to the
motherboard.

II. LEARNING COMPETENCIES

LO.1 Assemble computer hardware (TLE_IACSS9-12ICCS-Ia-e-28)

1.3 Identify materials necessary to complete the work in accordance with established
procedures and check against system requirements

Objectives:
1. Identify the parts of motherboard.
2. Label the parts of motherboard.
3. Reflect on the role of each part of a motherboard.

III. ACTIVITIES

A. LESSON INFORMATION

PARTS OF MOTHERBOARD
Where is the motherboard located?
A computer motherboard is located inside the computer case and is where most of the parts and
computer peripherals connect. With tower computers, the motherboard is on the left or right side
of the tower and is the biggest circuit board.

MOTHERBOARD COMPONENTS

A. Expansion slots (PCI Express, PCI, and AGP).

Alternatively known as a bus slot or expansion port, an expansion slot is a connection or port
inside a computer on the motherboard or riser card. It provides an installation point for a hardware
expansion card to be connected. For example, if you wanted to install a new video card in the
computer, you'd purchase a video expansion card and install that card into the compatible
expansion slot.
Computer expansion slots
AGP - Video card.
AMR - Modem, sound card.
CNR - Modem, network card, sound card.
EISA - SCSI, network card, video card.
ISA - Network card, sound card, video card.
PCI - Network card, SCSI, sound card, video card.
PCI Express - Video card, modem, sound card, network card.
VESA - Video card.
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B. 3-pin case fan connectors.

Alternatively referred to as a system fan, a case fan is located inside a computer, attached to
the front or back of its case. Case fans help bring cool air into and blow hot air out of the case.

C. BACK PANE CONNECTORS.

A connection is a term that describes the link between a plug or

connector into a port or jack. For example, your monitor, mouse,
and keyboard all must connect to the computer before they work.
Examples of computer connections
Below is a picture of the back of a desktop computer
and each of the connections and ports. Although your
desktop computer's layout may be different, this diagram
gives you a better understanding of where everything
connects.

Why are the colors on connections different?

Connections on the back of a computer may be color-coded to help locate the
appropriate port for a peripheral device. The list below includes many ports and
their associated colors.
Keyboard (PS/2) - Purple
Mouse (PS/2) - Green
Serial - Cyan
Printer - Violet
Monitor (VGA) - Blue
Monitor (DVI) - White
Line out (headphones) - Lime Green
Line in (microphone) - Pink
Audio in - Grey
Joystick - Yellow
Note
Many of the modern connector ports (HDMI, USB, FireWire, Ethernet, etc.) are black and need
to be identified by their shape rather than their color.

D. HEAT SINK.
A heat sink is a device that incorporates a fan or another mechanism to reduce the temperature
of a hardware component (e.g., processor). There are two heat sink types: active and passive.
The picture is an example of a heat sink that has both active and passive cooling mechanisms.

E. 4-PIN (P4) POWER CONNECTOR.

P4 may refer to any of the following:

1. The P4 connector is a 12V power supply cable used with motherboards that have
an Intel Pentium 4 or later processor. Today, the connector is a standard power
connector and is used with both Intel and AMD motherboards. As seen in the picture,
the P4 cable has two black wires that serve as a ground, and two yellow ones that
are +12VDC. All of these wires attach to a four pin connection on the motherboard.

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Note
If you purchase a new power supply with an 8-pin connector and your motherboard only needs
a P4 connector, you can separate the 8-pin into two 4-pin sections.

F. INDUCTOR.
A coil may refer to any of the following:
Short for electromagnetic coil, a coil is conducting wire such as copper shaped in
a helical form around an iron core. The coil creates an inductor or electromagnet to
store magnetic energy. Coils are often used to remove power spikes and dips from
power. The picture is an example of an inductor on a computer motherboard.
Tip
The core of a coil is usually iron, however, it may also be plastic and even air.

G. CAPACITOR.
A capacitor is a component made of two or sets of two conductive plates with a thin
insulator between them and wrapped in a ceramic and plastic container. When the
capacitor receives a DC (direct current), a positive charge builds up on the plate (or
set of plates) while a negative charge builds up on the other. This charge, which is
measured in microfarads on a computer capacitor, remains in the capacitor until it is
discharged. In the image, is an example of what a capacitor may look like on a
computer motherboard.

H. CPU SOCKET.
When referring to a processor, a CPU socket or processor socket is a connection that allows a
computer processor to connect to a motherboard. For example, the Socket 370 is an example of
such a socket. The picture shows an example of what a socket may look like on a motherboard.
Although there were computers that used the slot processor, most computers today and in the
past have used socket processors.

I. NORTHBRIDGE.
Alternatively referred to as the PAC (PCI/AGP Controller) and nb,
the Northbridge is an integrated circuit , AGP, and the memory. Unlike the
southbridge, the northbridge is directly connected to these components. It acts
as a "bridge" for the southbridge chip to communicate with the CPU, RAM, and
graphics controller. Today, the northbridge is a single-chip that is north of the PCI
bus, however, early computers may have had up to three separate chips that
made up the northbridge.

J. SCREW HOLE.
The picture shows an example of what a screw hole aka mounting hole would
look like on the corner of a motherboard. Each motherboard has several holes
to help hold the motherboard securely in place. Often the screw holes can be
easily identified because they'll have metal surrounding each hole. Some
earlier motherboards may also have holes without metal surrounding the hole.
For these types of holes, the motherboard should have included a cardboard or paper washer to
place between the screws and motherboard.

Sometimes referred to as standoff and spacer, standouts are small metal or

plastic screws that attach to a compute case and hold the motherboard in
place. The picture helps give an example of a standout. In this picture, the left
standout has a screw inserted in the hole to help demonstrate how it works.
The motherboard would be placed between the standout and the screw.

K. MEMORY SLOT.
A memory slot, memory socket, or RAM slot allows RAM (computer memory) to be inserted into
the computer. Most motherboards have two to four memory slots, which determine the type of
RAM used with the computer. The most common RAM types are SDRAM and DDR for desktop
computers and SODIMM for laptop computers, each having various types and speeds. The
picture below is an example of what memory slots may look like inside a desktop computer. In
this picture, there are three open and available slots for three memory sticks.

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L. SUPER I/O.
Short for super input/output, or super I/O, SIO is an integrated circuit on a
computer motherboard that handles the slower and less prominent input/output
devices shown below. When the super input/output was first introduced in the late
1980s, it was found on an expansion card. Later, this chip was embedded into the
motherboard and communicated over the ISA bus. As ISA began to no longer be
used with computers, SIO communicated over the PCI bus. Today, super I/O
communicates through the Southbridge and is still used with computers to support older legacy
devices.

Computer devices handled by the super I/O

✓ Floppy disk controller
✓ Game port
✓ Infrared
✓ Intrusion detection
✓ Keyboard and mouse (non-USB)
✓ Parallel port
✓ RTC (Real-time clock)
✓ Serial port UART
✓ Temperature sensor and fan speed.
Note
Some newer chipsets are combining the Southbridge and super I/O chips into a single chip and
referring to this chip as the Super Southbridge chip. Some manufacturers, such
as NVIDIA and SiS, have even combined the Northbridge, Southbridge, and super I/O into a
single chip.

How do I know what IC is the super I/O on my motherboard?

Identifying the super I/O on your motherboard is easy if you look for an integrated circuit that is
labeled with a company's name that manufacturers super I/O chips. Some common super I/O
manufacturers are Fintek, ITE, National Semiconductor, Nuvoton, SMSC, VIA, and Winbond.

M. FLOPPY CONNECTION.
The floppy channel, FDD header, or floppy connection is where the floppy
drive connects to the computer motherboard. In the picture below, is an
example of a motherboard with two IDE connections and a floppy channel
connector.

N. ATA / IDE DISK DRIVE PRIMARY CONNECTION.

Short for Integrated Drive Electronics, IDE is more commonly known
as ATA or PATA (parallel ATA). It is a standard interface for IBM computers
that was first developed by Western Digital and Compaq in 1986 for
compatible hard drives and CD or DVD drives. IDE is different
than SCSI and ESDI (Enhanced Small Disk Interface) because its controllers
are on each drive, meaning the drive can connect directly to the motherboard
or controller. IDE and its updated successor, EIDE (Enhanced IDE), are
common drive interfaces found in IBM compatible computers. Below is a picture of the IDE
connector on a hard drive, IDE cable, and the IDE channels on the motherboard.

Note
The location of the 1 pin (first pin) on an IDE cable is usually designated by the red stripe on
one side of the cable. In the example picture above, the 1 pin is on the right side of the cable.

O. 24-pin ATX power supply connector.

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An ATX style connector is a replacement for the older P8 and P9 AT style connector.
It is one of the largest connectors inside a computer. It connects a power supply to an
ATX style motherboard. As shown in the picture, the 20-pin cable is a multi-color cable
and may be labeled as P1.
Note
With the introduction of ATX-2, this cable is now a 24-pin cable and no longer a 20-pin
cable.
In the pictures, the ATX cable connector has a small clip on the top, which snaps and
holds the cable in place. This cable is also keyed, meaning it only connects in one direction.

A power supply with a 24-pin connector can be used on a motherboard with a 20-pin connector
by leaving the four additional pins disconnected. However, if you have a 24-pin connection on
your motherboard all 24-pins need to be connected. If you are using a power supply that does
not have a 24-pin connector, you need to purchase a new power supply.
Warning
When using a connector like that shown above, note the arrows pointing to each other. For the
cable to be correctly inserted, the arrows must point to each other.

P. SERIAL ATA CONNECTIONS.

Short for serial AT attachment, SATA 1.0 was first released in August 2001 and is a replacement
for the parallel ATA interface used in IBM compatible computers. SerialATA is capable of
delivering 1.5 Gbps (approximately 187 MBps) of
performance to each drive within a disk array. It is
backward-compatible with ATA and ATAPI devices, and
offers a thin, small cable solution, as seen in the "SATA
Data Cable" picture. This cable helps makes cable routing
easier and offers better airflow in the computer compared
to the earlier ribbon cables used with ATA drives.

Q. COIN CELL BATTERY (CMOS BACKUP BATTERY).

Alternatively referred to as a RTC (real-time clock), NVRAM (non-volatile
RAM) or CMOS RAM, CMOS is short for complementary metal-oxide
semiconductor. CMOS is an onboard, battery powered semiconductor chip
inside computers that stores information. This information ranges from the
system time and date to system hardware settings for your computer. The picture
shows an example of the most common CMOS coin cell battery (Panasonic CR 2032 3V) used
to power the CMOS memory.

R. RAID.
Short for redundant array of independent disks, RAID is an assortment of hard
drives connected and set up in ways to help protect or speed up the performance of a
computer's disk storage. RAID is commonly used on servers and high performance
computers. The picture of the Drobo is a good example of a device using RAID
technology. RAID uses several techniques used in RAID as explained below.
o Spanning and software striping
▪ Splitting information and writing it across multiple physical disk drives.
RAID 0 utilizes this technique.
o Mirroring
▪ Duplication of data from one disk drive to another.
o Duplexing
▪ Duplicates the disk drive and the disk controller.
o Deferred
▪ Data is cached in cache memory and writes to the hard drive as the disk
drive becomes available.
o Hot swapping
▪ Failed disk drives can be replaced and data can be placed back onto the
disk drive while the remainder of the system is in operation.
o Hot sparing
▪ Disk drive is automatically initialized into the array when another fails.
o Spindle synchronization
▪ Synchronization of the rotation of all disk drives in the array allowing
information to be written all at once.
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S. SYSTEM PANEL CONNECTORS.
Alternatively referred to as the fpanel or front panel connector, the system panel
connector or system panel header controls a computer power button, reset
button, and LED's. The System panel cables, as shown in the picture are two wire
cables that are color-coded to help identify where they connect to the motherboard
system panel connector. The black or white wire is the GND (ground) wire and the
colored wire is the powered wire. The cables, colors, and connections vary
depending on the computer case and motherboard you have, however, generally
include the cables mentioned below.

Types of system panel cables

HDD LED (IDE LED) - The LED activity light for the hard drive. This indicator is the
light that flashes as information is being written to and read from the hard drive.
PLED (Power LED) - The LED power light, which indicates when the computer is
on, off, or in Standby.
PWRSW (Power SW) - Controls the power button that allows you to turn on and
off the computer.
Reset SW - Handles the reset button to restart the computer.
Speaker - The internal speaker used to sound the beep noises you hear from your
computer when it is booting.

With most computer motherboards, the system panel cables are connected directly to the
motherboard. However, some motherboard manufacturers such as ASUS include a Q-
Connector with the motherboard. With a Q-Connector, the user can connect the system panel
cables away from the motherboard and then connect the Q-Connector to the motherboard.
Which direction do the system panel cables connect?

The system panel cables are not keyed so can be plugged in

any direction. Except for the LED cables, the system panel
connector cables can be plugged in any direction. If the LED
cables are plugged in backward, the LED light will not work.
Usually, with most modern motherboards, you can identify
what cable goes where by looking at the motherboard for a +
and a - symbol. The colored wire (powered wire) would
connect to the + symbol and a white or black cable (ground)
would connect to the - symbol.

In the diagram example above, copied from a motherboard

manual, you can see how each of these cables connects to
the motherboard. For example, in the top-left portion for the
PLED (Power LED), the first pin is PLED+, indicating the colored wire side should connect to it.
Keep in mind that how these cables connect varies depending on your motherboard.

T. FWH.
Short for firmware hub, FWH is part of the Intel Accelerated Hub Architecture that
contains both the system BIOS and integrated video BIOS on one component. The
FirmWare Hub connects directly to the ICH (I/O controller hub) without requiring
an ISA bus. The picture shows an example of an FWH chip in a PLCC.

U. SOUTHBRIDGE.
The southbridge is an IC on the motherboard responsible for the hard
drive controller, I/O controller and integrated hardware. Integrated
hardware can include the sound card and video card if on the
motherboard, USB, PCI, ISA, IDE, BIOS, and Ethernet.
The southbridge gets its name for commonly being South of the PCI bus.
Below is a graphic illustration of the ASUS P5AD2-E motherboard with
explanations of each of the major components including the southbridge.
It is common for the northbridge and southbridge to have a heat sink. Also,
the northbridge is usually slightly larger than the southbridge.

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Although the southbridge handles most of the I/O devices, less prominent input/output devices,
such as a serial port, keyboard, and non-USB mouse are handled by the SIO (super input/output).
Note
Some newer chipsets are combining the Southbridge and Super I/O chips into a single chip and
referring to this chip as the Super Southbridge chip. Some manufacturers such
as NVIDIA and SiS have even combined the Northbridge, Southbridge, and Super I/O into a
single chip.
Note
New motherboards are replacing the northbridge and the southbridge with IHA.

V. SERIAL PORT CONNECTOR.

An asynchronous port on the computer used to connect a serial device to the
computer and capable of transmitting one bit at a time. Serial ports are usually
identified on IBM compatible computers as COM (communications) ports. For
example, a mouse might connect to COM1 and a modem to COM2. The
picture shows the DB9 serial connector on a cable.

Where is the serial port on a computer?

The serial port is found on the back of the computer and is part of the motherboard.

Note
With the introduction of USB, FireWire, and other faster solutions serial ports are rarely used
compared to how often they've been used in the past. Also, many new computers and laptops
no longer have a serial port.
Identifying a serial port

In the above graphic of a serial port, you can notice the DB9 serial port connection is easy to
identify. The connection is in the shape of the letter D, is a male connector, and has 9 pins.

What is the serial port used for?

Below is a listing of various hardware components that can be purchased and used with your
serial port.
Mouse - One of the most commonly used devices for serial ports, usually used with computers
with no PS/2 or USB ports and specialty mice.
Modem - Another commonly used device for serial ports. Used commonly with older computers,
however, is also commonly used for its ease of use.
Network - One of the original uses of the serial port, which allowed two computers to connect
together and allow large files to be transferred between the two.
Printer - Today, this not a commonly used device for serial ports. However, was frequently used
with older printers and plotters.

Serial port pin information

Below is a listing of each of the pins on the DB9 connector, their purpose, and signal name.
Note
With many computers, the serial port is labeled as "10101" which are ones and
zeros to represent binary. A user may also interpret the number "1" as the
letter "I" and the zeros as the letter "O" and call it the "IOIOI" port.

As seen in the above picture, pin one is in the top left and pin 9 is in the bottom
right.
Note
Most of today's computers are eliminating the serial port in favor of USB ports.

W. USB HEADERS.
The 1394 header and USB header is a pin connection found on a computer
motherboard that allow additional 1394 and USB connections to be added to
the computer. For example, a USB add-on could be installed in one of
the drive bays and connected to the USB header to add additional USB ports.
The picture shows an example of what the 1394 and USB headers look like
on a computer motherboard.
In the picture, both the 1394 and USB headers have nine pins and closely
resemble each other. Every motherboard is different, the 1394 or USB
header on your motherboard may only have four or five pins.

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Caution
Plugging a 1394 header cable into the USB header connection or the USB header cable into a
1394 connection will damage a motherboard. Always consult your motherboard
manufacturer manual before connecting anything to the 1394 or USB header.
Other types of motherboard headers

A motherboard can have a header for any component that allows an external connection. Below
is a listing of other types of headers you may have on your motherboard. Each of the below
headers resemble the pictures of the headers mentioned earlier.
• Audio header
• Game port and MIDI header
• Network header
• Parallel port header
• PS/2 header
• Serial port header

X. JUMPERS.
Jumpers allow the computer to close an electrical circuit, allowing the electricity
to flow on a circuit board and perform a function. Jumpers consist of small pins
that can be covered with a small plastic box (jumper block), as shown in the
illustration. Below the illustration is a picture of what jumpers may look like on
your motherboard. In this example, the jumper is the white block covering two
of the three gold pins. Next to the pins is a silkscreen description of each of the
pin settings. The picture shows pins 1-2 jumped for Normal mode, 2-3 for config
mode, and when open, the computer is in recovery mode.
Tip
A jumper may also be referred to as a jumper shunt or shunt.

Y. INTEGRATED CIRCUIT.
Alternatively referred to as a bare chip, monolithic integrated circuit,
or microchip, IC is short for integrated circuit or integrated chip.
The IC is a package containing many circuits, logic gates,
pathways, transistors, and other components all working together to
perform a particular function or a series of functions. Integrated circuits
are the building blocks of computer hardware.
The picture shows an example of several integrated circuits. Because
the IC is fragile, it's often encased in a plastic package with metal pins
extending out of it to connect to a circuit board. An IC may be packaged
as SIP (single in-line package), DIP (dual in-line
package), PLCC (plastic leaded chip carrier), or another type.
Integrated circuit generations
Since their creation, there have been many different generations of integrated circuits with
increases to the number of transistors and logic gates per chip. Below is a list of each of the
generations and the approximate capacity of each chip.
SSI (small-scale integration) - 1 to 10 transistors and 1 to 12 logic gates.
MSI (medium-scale integration) - 10 to 500 transistors and 13 to 99 logic gates.
LSI (large-scale integration) - 500 to 20,000 transistors and 100 to 9,999 logic gates.
VLSI (very-large-scale integration) - 20,000 to 1,000,000 transistors and 10,000 to
99,999 logic gates.
ULSI (ultra-large-scale integration) - over 1,000,000 transistors and 100,000 logic
gates.

Z. 1394 HEADERS. SAME AS USB HEADER

AA. SPDIF.
Short for Sony and Phillips Digital Interconnect Format,
the S/PDIF or SPDIF interface transmits digital audio in a compressed form
between audio equipment and home theater systems. The S/PDIF interface can
utilize a coaxial cable or a fiber optic cable to transmit the audio. Common
equipment to use this interface are DVD players and CD players, connecting to
a home theater system for Dolby Digital or DTS surround sound. High
quality sound cards and laptops also have this connector. The first picture is an example of what
the SPDIF connector may look like on your computer motherboard.

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The audio transmitted is through the S/PDIF interface is defined by the IEC 61937
standard. The common formats transmitted are the 48 kHz sample rate (used in
DAT) and the 44.1 kHz sample rate (used in CD audio). The second picture is an
example of a fiber optic connection on the back of audio equipment.

AB. CD-IN.
Alternatively referred to as the optical drive audio connector, the CD-IN is a four-
pin connector found on a computer's motherboard or sound card that connects an
optical drive's audio. The picture shows a black four-pin connector and an example of
what this connector looks like on a computer motherboard.
For example, CD-IN could connect the four-pin cable on the back of a CD-ROM drive
to the corresponding audio connection on the motherboard, permitting direct playing
of CD audio.

TASK 1: CROSSWORD PUZZLE.

C. TASK 2

Direction: Give at least ten parts of motherboard and explain the function.

Parts of motherboards Functions

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D. TASK 3: PERFORMANCE TASK
Direction: Label the parts of the motherboard with their corresponding numbers and
choose among the options below. Write your answer on your answer sheet.

Expansion Slot AGP connector CD IN Back Panel

P4 power connector CNR Fan/system Fan CPU Socket
CNOS battery Northbridge USB header
Memory slot Front panel SATA connector
HDD connector /Headers 20/24 pins power connector BIOS

V. EVALUATION

WORDS SEARCH. Search the parts of motherboard

B. in your own opinion what do you think will happen if one part of the motherboard is
missing?

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VI. ANSWER KEY

Task 1: Evaluation

A.

B. answer may vary

VII. REFLECTION

Direction: Reflect on the following questions below, then write your responses on your
answer sheet.

1. What have you learned?

_____________________________________________________________________

2. What is important about your new learning?

_____________________________________________________________________

VIII. REFERENCES

https://windows101tricks.com/computer-motherboard/
https://www.computerhope.com/jargon/m/mothboar.htm

LAS DEVELOPMENT TEAM:

Writer:
Ervin G. Balaston
Teacher II
Bulan NHS

Reviewers:
Daisy M. Balaston
Carlos M. Gripon
Bulan NHS

Juvylyn G. Conda
Gate NHS

Vanessa B. Imperial
Alcoba NHS

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