An IT specialist sets up a new computer for a user who requires a high-end video card and the fastest hard drive possible. Which of the following connectors should the specialist verify are available on the motherboard? (Select two.)

To meet the user's requirements, the specialist must ensure the motherboard supports the appropriate high-speed interfaces. A high-end video card requires a Peripheral Component Interconnect Express (PCIe) slot, specifically a PCIe x16 slot, to provide the necessary bandwidth for modern graphics processing. For the "fastest hard drive possible," the current standard is a Solid-State Drive (SSD) that uses the Non-Volatile Memory Express (NVMe) protocol. NVMe drives typically connect to the motherboard via an M.2 slot, offering significantly higher data transfer speeds than older interfaces like SATA.

A. Molex: This is a legacy power connector from the Power Supply Unit (PSU) and is not a data interface on the motherboard.
C. SATA: This is a storage interface, but it is substantially slower than NVMe and would not fulfill the "fastest hard drive possible" requirement.
D. FireWire: This is an outdated external peripheral connection standard, not used for internal components like video cards or modern storage drives.
E. USB-C: This is a versatile external connector for peripherals and is not used to connect an internal high-end video card or primary storage drive. ---

1. Intel Corporation. (2022). Product Brief: Intel® Z790 Chipset. Document Number: 352276-001US. On page 1, the "Features" table and block diagram explicitly show dedicated "CPU PCIe 5.0 lanes" for graphics cards and "CPU PCIe 4.0 lanes" for NVMe storage devices, establishing these as the high-performance standards for their respective components.

2. Hennessy, J. L., & Patterson, D. A. (2019). Computer Architecture: A Quantitative Approach (6th ed.). Morgan Kaufmann. In Chapter 6, "Storage and Other I/O Topics," Section 6.4 discusses "Buses and Other Connections," detailing the Peripheral Component Interconnect Express (PCIe) as the standard high-performance interconnect for I/O devices like graphics cards. The chapter also contrasts the performance of NVMe with older protocols like SATA.

3. Stallings, W. (2018). Computer Organization and Architecture: Designing for Performance (11th ed.). Pearson. Chapter 7, "Input/Output," describes the evolution and structure of PCIe as the primary expansion bus for high-bandwidth devices. It also covers storage interfaces, explaining how NVMe is designed to capitalize on the low latency and parallelism of flash-based storage, connecting directly over the PCIe bus.