Ж Info. Tech. Brigade Ж

Picture order:
1 2
3 4
5 6

The overview of abit IP35P

Please ignore the blackish thing on the rear side of the motherboard, its just residue of some double-sided tape which I was unable to scrape off.

Misc accessories

Whatever is in Picture 1 is called the I/O Shield(I/O stands for Input/Output). It’s placed behind the chassis/casing where the I/O connectors are located.

From Picture 2, 3 & 4, you can observe 2 screws, 1 probably metallic(non conductive) while the latter plastic. These nuts are screwed on the motherboard tray and the motherboard is mounted on top of it. They function as distance from the conductive motherboard tray so that no short circuit issue may happen.

LGA775 Intel processor socket

The most recent release from Intel is LGA1366 processors aka Intel Core i7. This, however, is a LGA775 motherboard. From Picture 2, you can see the socket’s protector before it was removed.

Power Connectors

From Picture 1, you have the ATX 24pin power connector, which supplies the main power to the motherboard. Picture 2 shows you the 8pin power connector, dedicated for the processor. As for Picture 3, its the PWM(Pulse-width modulation, Google or Wiki it for more info) area.

You’ll notice from Picture 3 that they are tube like objects. Those are capacitors, electrolytic capacitors and full solid capacitors. You can identify full solid ones with its shiny metallic look. Enthusiasts expect to see longer life span and better performance/stability from solid capacitors.

Misc connectors

Picture 1: Front panel USB(Universal Serial Bus) connector
Picture 2: SATA(Serial ATA) ports
Picture 3: Floppy drive connector
Picture 4: IDE connector
Picture 5: Front panel Switch/LED connectors(from the picture, you’ve probably noticed the positive & negative markings, it matters. You just have to remember black & white cables is always negative or ground)
Picture 6: Front panel audio connector

Northbridge

I used a ruler to measure the length/width for the base of the northbridge chip. It measures 3.3cm², which can tell us roughly that the naked core(refer Picture 4, its a P35 chip, mirror-like) is about 1cm². Imagine that! Something so small yet actually there’s millions of transistors in it!

Picture 2 & 3 presents you the NB heat sink. Not really efficient but its enough for the job. Maybe you’d ask whats that white stuff below the NB heat sink, I will tell you what it is, its a layer of thermal sticker/thermal adhesive paper(performance differs) which conducts the heat from the chip to the sink to dissipate it passively(no fan).

Southbridge

Never measured this because the actual chip is below the IHS(integrated heat spreader), a cover over the chip. A similar IHS can be found on any processors, except this southbridge chip uses a plastic IHS(refer Picture 5 & 6)…

That white stuff that you see on top of the SB IHS & the SB heat sink is called thermal paste/thermal interface material(TIM, performance differs), which works the same way thermal stickers does but with better performance but more technique demanding compared to just applying a sticker. Look at Picture 6, that’s how you reapply the TIM. You must apply equal pressure when reattaching the heat sink for the paste to spread equally to achieve better performance.

Expansion slots

Picture 1 & 2 shows PCI-E expansion slots, the orange features a x16 bandwidth while the black x1. Graphics cards nowadays run PCI-E 2.0(the bandwidth doubles of its predecessor) slots, while P35 only offers PCI-E 1.1. It wouldn’t affect much, but for enthusiasts and performance seekers, its certainly a let down.

As for Picture 3, those are PCI expansion slots, which are for cards like wifi card, low-end audio card, LAN card and such.