NetPro Certification Courseware for NetPro Certified Systems Engineer – N.C.S.

CHIPSETS
In the early days of the PC, motherboards (and pretty much every other device) were
designed and built with discrete logic gates. If you were around in the days of the
PC/XT and PC/AT, you probably remember the huge motherboards packed with over
150 to 200 individual ICs. Discrete ICs demanded a lot of power, and took up lots of
room. It didn’t take designers long to realize that “standard” functions of the PC (like
floppy drive inter-face circuits, DMA controllers, or programmable interrupt
controllers) could be integrated onto Application-Specific ICs (or ASICs). With the
use of ASICs, PCs were able to drop their chip count, reduce construction costs, and
reduce power requirements. But there are also performance advantages to such high
levels of integration. Combining logic circuitry onto a single IC dramatically shortens
the signal paths, and allows the circuit to operate at higher speeds. By optimizing the
signal paths within the IC itself, performance could be improved even further.
Designers quickly saw that they could integrate all the core logic needed to facilitate a
complete PC in just a few highly integrated ICs. Because these chips were specifically
designed to be used as a set on the motherboard, they were dubbed the chipset.

Today, chipsets play a leading role in the design and fabrication of modern personal
computers. Where early motherboards could use hundreds of ICs, you’d be hard-
pressed to find more than 20 ICs on a current motherboard. In fact, chipsets are so
important that new chipsets must be developed to support each new feature or CPU.
For example, you’ll find that Intel’s 430 TX chipset supports features, such as
SDRAM, dual CPUs, ACPI, and Ultra DMA—but the venerable 430 HX chipset does
not. As a result, motherboards with a 430 HX chipset would have to be replaced with
a motherboard using the 430 TX chipset before those features would be available.
Ultimately, the overall features and capabilities of your PC are largely defined by the
motherboard chipset (sometimes called core logic). This chapter is intended to
familiarize you with many of the current chipsets in use today. If you want detailed
technical information about today’s chipsets, you can usually download the complete
manual from the chipset manufacturer’s Web site (in Adobe Acrobat’s .PDF format).
When we speak about buses and motherboards, we are also speaking about chip sets.

The chip sets are a bunch of intelligent controller chips, which are on any
motherboard. The controllers are closely tied to the CPU, in that they control the
buses around the CPU. Without the chip sets, neither RAM or I/O buses could
function together with the CPU.
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Therefore, the chip sets are quite central components on the motherboards. When new
technological features are introduced (and this happens continuously) they are often
accompanied by new chip sets. The new chip sets often enable.

• Higher speed on one or more buses

• Utilization of new facilities (new RAM types, new buses, improved EIDE, etc.)

THE VENDORS

There are several suppliers of chip sets for the motherboard:

• Intel
• SIS
• Opti
• Via
• ALi
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Intel has hitherto been the leader in supplying chip sets to the Pentium motherboard.
Therefore, let us just mention their chip sets, which have astronomical names.
The Neptune chip set (82434NX) was introduced in June 1994. It replaced the
Mercury set (82434LX). In both chip sets, there were problems with the PCI bus. In
January 1995 Intel introduced the first Triton, where everything worked. This chip set
supports some new features: it supports EDO RAM, and it offers bus master
integrated EIDE control. However, the following chip sets were of much higher
quality, and within very few years they lead to several new generations of chip sets,
each of them more powerful and offering great new features.

Triton first and second

The interest in chip sets and their performance started in late 1995, when the Pentium
processor became more popular. The Triton controllers were the first chip sets in this
trend. 82430FX from late 1995 was Intel's next chip set and the first Triton. In
February 1996 the second generation of Triton arrived. Two new chip sets were
introduced: The 82430VX and 82430HX. The last (HX) was the fastest one.

VX and HX
The two sets were similar, yet different. 430HX consisted of two chips. It was
designed for the more professional PCs. 430VX consisted of four chips, but the cost
was slightly lower than HX. It was aimed at the home use PC market. Let us look at
the contents of each chip set:

Chip set Contents

82430HX 82439HX System Controller (TXC)

+ 82371SB PCI ISA IDE Accelerator

82430VX 82437VX System Controller (TVX)

+ two 82438VX Data Path Units (TDX)
+ 82371SB PCI ISA IDE Accelerator

The Intel 430 VX chipset (also referred to as the “Triton II” chipset) is used in
relatively recent Pentium-based PCs that are designed for low-end or end-user
applications (e.g., multimedia, games, and personal productivity software). The 430
VX chipset integrates support for the Universal Serial Bus (USB) standard, so home
users can add a wide variety of Plug-and-Play digital input devices, such as mice,
keyboards, joysticks, scanners, and cameras. The 430 VX supports concurrent PCI
architecture, which maximizes system performance with simultaneous activity on the
CPU, PCI, and ISA buses. This generally improves video and audio performance for
multimedia applications, and allows more high-speed peripherals in the systems
without impacting the performance of the PCI bus. Improved EDO memory support,
faster timing, and support for Synchronous DRAM (SDRAM) are also included.
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Memory support also allows the Shared Memory Buffer Architecture (SMBA) option.
The Intel 430VX PCI set consists of the 82437VX system controller, two 82438VX
data paths, and the 82371SB PCI ISA IDE Accelerator (PIIX3). Although the 430 VX
is generally considered to be a good performer, some features are noticeably absent.
There is no support for multiple CPUs, and no support for ECC. The chipset will only
handle up to 128MB of RAM (but only 64MB are cacheable). RAM timing is also a
bit slower than the 430 HX, so 430 TX systems tend to be a bit slower even when
SDRAM is installed.

A bridge to the I/O system

The chip makes a bridge between the CPU, ISA and PCI bus. The news was, that it
permitted concurrent activity in all three locations, thus a new form of multitasking.
This is significant for daily use. All data exchange to and from I/O units cross this
intersection, which now has achieved greater width.

New in the chip was also the host function for USB. It is the Universal Serial Bus,
which was not much use at this time. Finally, the chip included a EIDE Bus Master
control. In short that means, that EIDE components like hard disks, to some extent
can deliver their data directly to RAM without taking up CPU time
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Above, you see the 82371SB chip and below, again, its placement relative to CPU
and buses.
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The differences between HX and VX

It was generally accepted, that the HX set yielded the best performance of the two
chip sets described. But the VX set had two other facilities to offer: Capability for
SMBA (Shared Memory Buffer Architecture). That means among other things, that
you can integrate the video card on the motherboard with 1 or 2 MB standard RAM,
from the working RAM. A technology, which is used only in the lowest cost PCs, and
which soon was abandoned.
Also, the VX set also supported the fast RAM type SD-RAM. HX did not. The VX
set could control up to 128 MB RAM, but it could not cache above 64 MB RAM.
HX controlled 512 MB RAM and was the only Intel Pentium chip set to cache above
64 MB RAM.
The VX and HX chip sets are both out. The TX chip set replaced them, which was the
last Intel chip set for Socket 7 mounted CPUs. Today Ali and VIA produces chip sets
for Socket 7 motherboards.

INTEL 430 TX PENTIUM CHIPSET

The 430 TX chipset optimizes the capabilities of the Intel Pentium processor with
MMX technology (Pentium MMX), and has found “dual-duty” in both desktop and
mobile PCs. Reduced power consumption enables new applications by delivering
mobile-style power management to the desktop. The 430 TX chipset features
Dynamic Power Management Architecture (DPMA)—extending the battery life of
mobile computers, and enabling new power-efficient desktop models. Support for the
Advanced Configuration and Power Interface (ACPI) also improves power
management.

The 430 TX also supports the Ultra DMA disk drive protocol with the enhancements
required for faster performance of today’s multimedia applications. For higher
memory throughput, the chip set supports Synchronous DRAM (or a mix of SDRAM
and EDO RAM). Concurrent PCI support is available for the first time in a mobile
PCI chip set, enabling faster and smoother video and audio performance. There is also
support for the Universal Serial Bus (USB). With the “outside the box” Plug-and-Play
capabilities of USB, the 430 TX chipset helps the integration of multimedia, I/O
peripherals, and digital imaging devices. The 430 TX also implements a full System
Management Bus (SMBus) host controller with three-wire interface—through which
the system can communicate with simple monitoring controllers. For example, “Smart
Battery” devices can provide information to the power-management charging system
via the SMBus. The user can then be informed of the current battery state, along with
an accurate prediction of the available operating time (or remaining time to fully
charge the battery). Table 8-4 compares the features of the 430 TX.
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The 430 TX chipset is a two-chip solution consisting of the 82439TX system

controller, and the 82371AB PCI ISA IDE Xcelerator. The 430 TX forms a host-to-
PCI bridge, provides the second level (L2) cache control, and offers a full 64-bit data
path to main memory. The system controller integrates the cache and main memory
DRAM control functions, and provides bus control for transfers between the CPU,
cache, main memory, and the PCI bus. The L2 cache controller supports write-back
cache for cache sizes of 256KB and 512KB (cache-less designs are also supported).

The controllers in the TX chip set

Chip set Chips included

82430TX 82439TX System Controller (TXC)

82371AB PCI ISA IDE Accelerator

The TX set is an update and improvement of the VX set. Relative to this, the TX
firstly supports SD RAM and Ultra DMA hard disks. Two important technologies.
But the TX-set cannot cache above 64 MB RAM, and that was a problem.

The TX chip set was Intel's last and final set for Socket 7 motherboards. After that
VIA and ALi took over and continued this work.