Comparison Asus PRIME B350M-K vs Asus PRIME B350M-A

Motherboard dimensions in height and width. It is assumed that the traditional placement of motherboards is vertical, so in this case one of the dimensions is called not the length, but the height.

Motherboard sizes are largely determined by their form factors (see above), however, the size of a particular motherboard may differ slightly from the standard adopted for this form factor. In addition, it is usually easier to clarify the dimensions according to the characteristics of a particular motherboard than to look for or remember general information on the form factor. Therefore, size data can be given even for models that fully comply with the standard.

The third dimension — thickness — is considered less important for a number of reasons, so it is often omitted.

The number of slots for DDR4 memory sticks provided in the motherboard.

DDR4 is a further (after the third version) development of the DDR standard, released in 2014. Improvements compared to DDR3 are traditional — an increase in operating speed and a decrease in power consumption; The volume of one module can be from 2 to 128 GB. It is this RAM standard that most modern motherboards are designed for; the number of slots for DDR4 is usually 2 or 4, less often — 6 or more.

The maximum amount of RAM that can be installed on the motherboard.

When choosing according to this parameter, it is important to take into account the planned use of the PC and the real needs of the user. So, volumes up to 32 GB inclusive are quite enough to solve any basic problems and run games comfortably, but without a significant reserve for an upgrade. 64 GB is the optimal option for many professional use cases, and for the most resource-intensive tasks like 3D rendering, 96 GB or even 128 GB of memory will not be a limit. The most “capacious” motherboards are compatible with volumes of 192 GB or more - they are mainly top-end solutions for servers and HEDT (see “In the direction”).

You can choose this parameter with a reserve – taking into account a potential RAM upgrade, because installing additional RAM sticks is the simplest way to increase system performance. Taking this factor into account, many relatively simple motherboards support very significant amounts of RAM.

Number of SATA 3 ports on the motherboard.

SATA is now the standard interface for connecting internal drives (mainly HDDs) and optical drives. One device is connected to one such connector, so the number of SATA ports corresponds to the number of internal drives / drives that can be connected to the motherboard through such an interface. A large number ( 6 SATA ports and more) is necessary in case of active use of several hard drives and other peripherals. For domestic use, 4 is enough. SATA 3, as the name suggests, is the third version of this interface, operating at a total speed of about 6 Gbps; the useful speed, taking into account the redundancy of the transmitted data, is about 4.8 Mbps (600 MB / s) — that is, twice as much as in SATA 2.

Note that different SATA standards are quite compatible with each other in both directions: older drives can be connected to newer ports, and vice versa. The only thing is that the data transfer rate will be limited by the capabilities of the slower version, and in some cases it may be necessary to reconfigure the drives with hardware (switches, jumpers) or software. It is also worth saying that SATA 3 is the newest and most advanced variation of SATA today, but the capabilities of this standard are not enough to unlock the full potential of high-speed SSDs. Therefore, SATA 3 is mainly used for hard drives and low-cost SSDs, faster drives are conn...ected to specially designed connectors like M.2 or U.2 (see below).

The motherboard has its own HDMI output.

Such an output is intended for transmitting video from an integrated graphics card (see above) or a processor with integrated graphics (we emphasize that it is impossible to output a signal from a discrete graphics card through the motherboard chipset). As for HDMI specifically, it is a combined digital video/audio interface specifically designed to work with HD resolutions and multi-channel audio. Today it is the most common of these interfaces, HDMI support is almost mandatory for video devices that are compatible with HD standards.

The specific capabilities of HDMI vary by version (see below for more details), but in general they are quite impressive — even in the earliest (current today) HDMI v.1.4, the maximum resolution is 4K, and in newer standards it reaches 10K. So in motherboards, the quality of the video transmitted through such an output is often limited not by the interface capabilities, but by the graphics performance of the system.

The number of USB 2.0 connectors installed on the back of the motherboard.

Recall that USB is the most popular modern connector for connecting various external peripherals — from keyboards and mice to specialized equipment. And USB 2.0 is the oldest version of this interface that is relevant today; it is noticeably inferior to the newer USB 3.2 both in terms of speed (up to 480 Mbps), and in terms of power supply and additional functionality. On the other hand, even such characteristics are often enough for undemanding peripherals (like the same keyboards / mice); and devices of newer versions can be connected to the connectors of this standard — there would be enough power supply. So this version of USB is still found in modern motherboards, although there are fewer and fewer new models with USB 2.0 connectors.

Note that in addition to the connectors on the rear panel, connectors on the board itself (more precisely, ports on the PC case connected to such connectors) can also provide a USB connection. See below for more on this.

The number of native USB 3.2 gen2 connectors provided on the back of the motherboard. In this case, we mean traditional, full-size USB A ports.

USB 3.2 gen2(formerly known as USB 3.1 gen2 and simply USB 3.1) is the evolution of USB 3.2 after version 3.2 gen1 (see above). This standard provides connection speeds up to 10 Gbps, and to power external devices in such connectors, USB Power Delivery technology (see below) can be provided, which allows you to output up to 100 W per device (however, Power Delivery support is not mandatory, its presence should be specified separately). Traditionally for the USB standard, this interface is backwards compatible with previous versions — in other words, you can easily connect a device supporting USB 2.0 or 3.2 gen1 to this port (unless the speed will be limited by the capabilities of a slower version).

The more connectors provided in the design, the more peripheral devices can be connected to the motherboard without the use of additional equipment (USB splitters). In some models of motherboards, the number of ports of this type is 5 or even more. At the same time, we note that in addition to the connectors on the rear panel, connectors on the board itself (more precisely, ports on the case connected to such connectors) can also provide a USB connection. See below for more on this.

The number of connectors for powering coolers and fans provided in the motherboard. A processor cooler is usually connected to such a connector, and fans of other system components — video cards, cases, etc. can also be powered from the "motherboard"; sometimes it is more convenient than pulling power directly from the PSU (at least you can reduce the number of wires in the case). Many modern boards are equipped with 4 or more connectors of this type.