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28-404: Much the way the system BIOS provides a set of functions that are used by software programs to access the system hardware, the video BIOS provides a set of video-related functions that are used by programs to access the video hardware as well as storing vendor-specific settings such as card name, clock frequencies, VRAM types & voltages. The video BIOS interfaces software to the video chipset in

56-568: A system on chip (SoC) used in a mobile phone. In computing , the term chipset commonly refers to a set of specialized chips on a computer 's motherboard or an expansion card . In personal computers , the first chipset for the IBM PC AT of 1984 was the NEAT chipset developed by Chips and Technologies for the Intel 80286 CPU. In home computers , game consoles, and arcade hardware of

84-489: A Video BIOS. When the computer is started, some graphics cards (usually certain Nvidia cards) display their vendor, model, Video BIOS version and amount of video memory . Up until the mid 2010s, video ROMs were user-editable/modifiable, which allowed users to configure GPU features like core clocks, VRAM clocks or fan speed curves. In certain cases, a different GPU class could have been unlocked (the most famous example being

112-438: A chipset; it only continues to be present for interfacing with low speed I/O. AMD server CPUs adopt a self contained system on chip design instead which doesn't require a chipset. The northbridge to southbridge interconnect interfaces used now are DMI ( Intel ) and UMI ( AMD ). These can also be used for connecting from a processor to a chipset. Chips and Technologies Chips and Technologies, Inc. ( C&T ),

140-544: A compatible VGA chipset, the 82C451, and VGA cards were introduced the same year as VGA (1987) based on the 82C451, opening up the IBM compatible graphics display market. This market was then entered by companies such as Trident Microsystems , Western Digital , Cirrus Logic , Oak Technology , and others, until it was saturated. Chips and Technologies provided the Wingine video card, a very high speed framebuffer that sat in

168-522: A firmware image from another OEM , thus unlocking higher performance modes or changing its mode of operation. Older NVIDIA GPU ROMs up until the GeForce 900 series could be edited using NiBiTor (NVIDIA BIOS Editor). This computer graphics –related article is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . Chipset In a computer system, a chipset is a set of electronic components on one or more integrated circuits that manages

196-456: A hardware acceleration. Apple used a number of C&T controllers in their PowerBook line. Among others, the 65550 was used in the PowerBook 3400 and the faster 65554 was used in the "Kanga" PowerBook G3 , which was derived from the 3400. Early NuBus PowerBooks such as the PowerBook 1400 used the less-sophisticated 65525A. C&T eventually ended up competing in the low end of

224-455: A proprietary local bus slot on supported motherboards. Epson and JCIS were two manufacturers who offered motherboards featuring the Wingine local bus slot. The Wingine was popular with users of NEXTSTEP for Intel processors, as it was one of the highest performing video cards supported by the operating system. Latest HiQVision architecture (65550, 65554, 65555, 68554, 69000 and 69030) added

252-498: A traditional northbridge to do so. Intel followed suit in 2008 with the release of its Core i series CPUs and the X58 platform. In newer processors integration has further increased, primarily through the inclusion of the system's primary PCIe controller and integrated graphics directly on the CPU itself. As fewer functions are left un-handled by the processor, chipset vendors have condensed

280-554: The AMD Radeon HD6950 and HD6970 series who shared the same GPU, with some shading units disabled through the BIOS on the former. These units could be unlocked by replacing the original HD6950 BIOS with an HD6970 BIOS. The card would then behave as an actual HD6970). However, nowadays both NVIDIA and AMD digitally sign video firmware, which has made it impossible to make any changes to it. Still, in many cases, users can flash

308-737: The BIOS , the only software that is present at this early stage. The system BIOS loads the video BIOS from the card's ROM into system RAM and transfers control to it early in the boot sequence. Early PCs contained functions for driving MDA and CGA cards in the system BIOS, and those cards did not have any Video BIOS built in. When the EGA card was first sold in 1984, the Video BIOS was introduced to make these cards compatible with existing PCs whose BIOS did not know how to drive an EGA card. Ever since, EGA/VGA and all enhanced VGA compatible cards have included

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336-727: The NCR 53C9x , a low-cost chipset implementing a SCSI interface to storage devices, could be found in Unix machines such as the MIPS Magnum , embedded devices, and personal computers. Traditionally in x86 computers, the processor's primary connection to the rest of the machine was through the motherboard chipset's northbridge. The northbridge was directly responsible for communications with high-speed devices (system memory and primary expansion buses, such as PCIe, AGP, and PCI cards, being common examples) and conversely any system communication back to

364-413: The data flow between the processor , memory and peripherals . The chipset is usually found on the motherboard of computers. Chipsets are usually designed to work with a specific family of microprocessors . Because it controls communications between the processor and external devices, the chipset plays a crucial role in determining system performance . Sometimes the term "chipset" is used to describe

392-486: The 144 pin PGA package was incompatible with 386 socket. Chips and Technologies was the first company (outside of IBM) to deliver an EGA -compatible chipset. The Enhanced Graphics CHIPSet consisted of the four chips: Later C&T announced a "Super EGA" dual-chip chipset: 82C435 Enhanced Graphics Controller and 82A436 Bus Interface with resolution up to 800×600 38MHz. C&T was the first company (outside of IBM) to deliver

420-505: The 1980s and 1990s, the term chipset was used for the custom audio and graphics chips. Examples include the Original Amiga chipset and Sega 's System 16 chipset. In x86 -based personal computers, the term chipset often refers to a specific pair of chips on the motherboard: the northbridge and the southbridge . The northbridge links the CPU to very high-speed devices, especially RAM and graphics controllers , and

448-617: The 1990s, a major designer and manufacturer of chipsets was VLSI Technology in Tempe, Arizona. Some of their innovations included the integration of PCI bridge logic, the GraphiCore 2D graphics accelerator and direct support for synchronous DRAM, the forerunner of DDR SDRAM memory. The Apple Macintosh SE , Macintosh II and later the Quadras series used chipsets from VLSI Technology , even though they were ASICs designed by Apple. After

476-584: The C&;T chips to Asiliant. Asiliant manufactured and sold C&T components for the next few years until it closed. C&T SuperMath J38700DX was an 80387DX compatible FPU coprocessor . C&T also designed a 386 -compatible microprocessor known as the Super386 38600DX/38600SX using clean room design techniques, but this chip never enjoyed as much success as the 386 CPUs produced by Intel , AMD , and Cyrix . C&T 38605DX had 512 byte cache, but

504-584: The CPU die itself (the chipset often contains secondary PCIe connections though). However, the Platform Controller Hub was also integrated into the processor package as a second die for mobile variants of the Skylake processors. AMD's FCH has been discontinued since the release of the Carrizo series of CPUs as it has been integrated into the same die as the rest of the CPU. However, since

532-454: The interface between a northbridge and southbridge was the PCI bus. Before 2003, any interaction between a CPU and main memory or an expansion device such as a graphics card(s) — whether AGP , PCI or integrated into the motherboard — was directly controlled by the northbridge IC on behalf of the processor. This made processor performance highly dependent on the system chipset, especially

560-454: The northbridge's memory performance and ability to shuttle this information back to the processor. In 2003, however, AMD's introduction of the Athlon 64 series of processors changed this. The Athlon 64 marked the introduction of an integrated memory controller being incorporated into the processor itself thus allowing the processor to directly access and handle memory, negating the need for

588-532: The processor. This connection between the processor and northbridge is commonly designated the front-side bus (FSB). Requests to resources not directly controlled by the northbridge were offloaded to the southbridge, with the northbridge being an intermediary between the processor and the southbridge. The southbridge handled "everything else", generally lower-speed peripherals and board functions (the largest being hard disk and storage connectivity) such as USB, parallel and serial communications. In 1990s and early 2000s,

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616-521: The release of the Zen architecture, there's still a component called a chipset which only handles relatively low speed I/O such as USB and SATA ports and connects to the CPU with a PCIe connection. In these systems all PCIe connections are routed directly to the CPU. The UMI interface previously used by AMD for communicating with the FCH is replaced with a PCIe connection. Technically the processor can operate without

644-445: The remaining northbridge and southbridge functions into a single chip. Intel's version of this is the " Platform Controller Hub " (PCH) while AMD's version was called Fusion Controller Hub (FCH). The PCH is still called a chipset. This is an enhanced southbridge for the remaining peripherals—as traditional northbridge duties, such as memory controller, expansion bus (PCIe) interface and even on-board video controller, are integrated into

672-499: The same way that the system BIOS does for the system chipset. The ROM also contained a basic font set to upload to the video adapter font RAM, if the video card did not contain a font ROM with this font set instead. Unlike some other hardware components, the video card usually needs to be active very early during the boot process so that the user can see what is going on. This requires the card to be activated before any operating system begins loading; thus it needs to be activated by

700-421: The southbridge connects to lower-speed peripheral buses (such as PCI or ISA ). In many modern chipsets, the southbridge contains some on-chip integrated peripherals , such as Ethernet , USB , and audio devices. Motherboards and their chipsets often come from different manufacturers. As of 2021 , manufacturers of chipsets for x86 motherboards include AMD , Intel , VIA Technologies and Zhaoxin . In

728-506: The switch to PowerPC , Apple used various ASIC suppliers for their chipsets such as VLSI technology, Texas Instruments , LSI Logic or Lucent Technologies (later known as Agere Systems ). When Apple switched to Intel they used traditional PC chipsets. In the 1980s, Chips and Technologies pioneered the manufacturing of chipsets for PC-compatible computers. Computer systems produced since then often share commonly used chipsets, even across widely disparate computing specialties. For example,

756-640: Was an early fabless semiconductor company founded in Milpitas, California , in December 1984 by Gordon A. Campbell and Dado Banatao . Its first product, announced September 1985, was a four chip EGA chipset that handled the functions of 19 of IBM 's proprietary chips on the Enhanced Graphics Adapter . By that November's COMDEX , more than a half dozen companies had introduced EGA-compatible boards based on C&T's chipset. This

784-528: Was followed by chipsets for PC motherboards and other computer graphics chips . C&T was acquired by Intel in 1997, primarily for its graphics chip business. Former members of C&T founded Asiliant Technologies in January 2000 to continue the support of the CHIPS 65545, 65550, 65555, 69000, 69030, and other notebook and LCD oriented graphics ICs. Intel licensed the rights to build, sell, and service

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