Chapter 1: Introduction
1-9
1-2 Chipset
Overview
The H8SMi-2/H8SMA-2 motherboard is based on the nVidia MCP55 Pro chipset.
The nVidia MCP55 Pro functions as Media and Communications Processor (MCP).
Controllers for the system memory are integrated directly into AMD Opteron pro-
cessors.
MCP55 Pro Media and Communications Processor
The MCP55 Pro is a single-chip, high-performance HyperTransport peripheral con-
troller. It includes a 28-lane PCI Express interface, an AMD Opteron 16-bit Hyper
Transport interface link, a six-port Serial ATA interface, a dual-port Gb Ethernet
interface, a dual ATA133 bus master interface and a USB 2.0 interface. This hub
connects directly to the CPU.
HyperTransport Technology
HyperTransport technology is a high-speed, low latency point to point link that was
designed to increase the communication speed by a factor of up to 48x between
integrated circuits. This is done partly by reducing the number of buses in the
chipset to reduce bottlenecks and by enabling a more effi cient use of memory in
multi-processor systems. The end result is a signifi cant increase in bandwidth
within the chipset.
