Northbridge and Southbridge

Northbridge and Southbridge

Northbridge and Southbridge are mapped areas with some important components of a Motherboard. Quite obviously every computer has a motherboard and therefore these Northbridge and Southbridge. Almost a year ago, we published an article – Components of a motherboard. With increasing integration of important and frequently used interfaces, many parts has been integrated into the chipset. You think the basic circuitry of the chipset as a map – Northbridge is in the north and the southbridge in the south. These names Northbridge and Southbridge �were originally introduced by Intel.

Position of the Northbridge and Southbridge on a Motherboard

As we have said – Northbridge is in the north and the southbridge in the south. But the basic question is – which side is North. As the Processor or CPU is taken as the most important component, the side where the CPU is, is taken as the North. So, our Northbridge is situated to the closest southern part of the Processor and Southbridge is in the extreme South – usually where all the important ports are situated.

Components of Northbridge and Southbridge

Components of nothbridge :

Northbridge is becoming less important as memory controller and graphics chips are getting in the processor itself now. Classically the nothbridge has�:

• Memory controller
• Graphics card� Interface – AGP or�PCI Express
• Processor Interface �- FSB
• Connection with the Southbridge

In some models, northbride has connection with RAM too.

Components of southbridge :

South Bridge is connected to the northbridge via a bus or a direct connection. Although southbridge is mainly responsible for the management of peripheral interfaces it is connected to the processor.�Also the BIOS is included here.

• Link to northbridge
• Peripheral interfaces
• BIOS