Subject

    Computer Science

    Topic

    Computer Hardware

    What is the 'system bus speed' or 'Front-Side Bus (FSB) speed' in older computer architectures?

    a)
    The internal clock speed of the CPU core.
    b)
    The speed of the connection between the CPU and the Northbridge chipset.
    c)
    The data transfer rate of the hard drive.
    d)
    The refresh rate of the system memory.

    Explanation

    The FSB was the main communication path between the CPU and the rest of the motherboard, particularly the memory controller in the Northbridge. The CPU's clock speed was often a multiple of the FSB speed (e.g., a 133MHz FSB with a 20x multiplier would result in a 2.66GHz CPU). This concept is less relevant today as modern CPUs have an integrated memory controller.

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