Finding out the motherboard make and model inside your computer isn’t always the easiest of challenges: Unlike, say, your graphics card, it’s not listed in the Device Manager—and not everyone wants to be opening up their desktop (or laptop) to take a peek at the circuitry inside.
There are all kinds of reasons why you might want to know your motherboard make and model, whether you’re troubleshooting problems, thinking about upgrading your computer, or selling it on to someone else. Here’s how to find out the key information on Windows, macOS, and Linux.
Checking your motherboard on Windows
Use the Start menu to search for and launch the System Information utility built into Windows, and under System Summary you’ll see three entries related to your motherboard: Baseboard Manufacturer, BaseBoard Product, and Baseboard Version. That tells you everything you need to know about the board inside your PC, except for its unique serial number.
To get that information, head to the command prompt by typing “cmd” into the Start menu search box and choosing the Command Prompt entry. Type in “wmic baseboard get product,manufacturer,version,serialnumber” and hit Enter, and you get the three bits of information we saw before, together with the serial number.
System Information will reveal details of your motherboard.
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That should mean you’re well-covered, but plenty of third-party utilities will give you the same information too. These tools can be handy for getting full-system specs lists that are a bit easier to understand than the raw information that Windows spits out, and one of the best free options is CPU-Z: It lists motherboard specs as well as details of your installed memory and processor.
Another similarly well-respected tool is HWiNFO, which is free for personal use. As well as giving you a comprehensive breakdown of all the key components inside your system (including the motherboard), the utility also shows you processor and memory usage in real time, so you can see how your PC is coping with the demands you’re putting on it.
Checking your motherboard on macOS
On a Mac, the motherboard is called the logic board, and finding out details about it is harder than it used to be. If your Mac was launched before April 2021, you can use the old method: Get your computer’s serial number by opening the Apple menu, then choosing About This Mac.
The serial number is listed alongside the main chipset, the amount of RAM you have, and the version of macOS you’re running. Next, you need to plug this serial number into an online database like the one offered by replacement specialist PowerbookMedic: This will bring up a host of information about your Mac, including the motherboard details.
The About This Mac page is a good starting point for identifying your motherboard.
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However, as EveryMac points out, since April 2021 Apple has used serial numbers that prevent individual Macs from being identified, making it much harder to figure out what the motherboard is. However, you can use the EveryMac site to get more Mac specs based on your Model Number, Model Identifier, Order Number, or EMC Number, and EveryMac has detailed instructions for finding these numbers on your physical hardware or in the documentation you got when you bought the Mac.
With the way modern Macs and MacBooks are made, the logic board and everything fastened on to it is really one complete component: As long as you know which chipset your Mac is running and which model of computer you have (via About This Mac), that should do for all your troubleshooting, repair, and selling needs. If you do need more information about the logic board, teardowns from iFixit can be helpful.
Checking your motherboard on Linux
Finding out the type of motherboard you’ve got on a Linux computer is fairly straightforward. You need to launch a Terminal window, then type “sudo dmidecode -t 2” and hit Enter. Type in your user account password, hit Enter again, and you’ll be met with all the details of your motherboard (called a base board here), including the manufacturer, product name and serial number.
The dmidecode command dumps the information in the DMI (Desktop Management Interface) Table or SMBIOS (System Management Basic Input Output System). If you want to see more details about the components that your Linux operating system is running on top of, try the “sudo dmidecode | more” command.
This is the command you need for motherboard information on Linux.
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Another related command you can type into the Terminal window is “lspci”—this simply lists all the PCI (Peripheral Component Interconnect) buses on your system, so you should get more details about different bits of hardware connected up to your motherboard (such as the processor, graphics card, and wireless controllers).
If you’re not particularly comfortable using the Terminal, third-party tools are available that offer a more user-friendly experience while retrieving the details of your motherboard spec (and the spec of other system components). A couple of these tools that are worth testing on your Linux system are HardInfo and CPU-G.
Checking your motherboard box
You do have another option for identifying the motherboard that’s inside your computer: the box it came in. If you bought a pre-built computer, you may well have been given the motherboard box as well, with a variety of spare connectors and instruction manuals in it; and if you’ve built your own PC, then buying a motherboard will have been part of that.
Every motherboard box is different, but the make and model shouldn’t be too hard to find—they’ll probably be emblazoned right across the front of the packaging. Look a bit closer and you should be able to find some useful extra information about the board, including the type of CPUs it supports.
If you’ve got the box for your motherboard, it will reveal all.
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This is of course useful if you’re building your own computer, because you don’t want to buy components that are incompatible with your main motherboard. You should also be able to find the serial number of the board somewhere on the package—this is most likely close to wherever the barcode is on the box.
Finally, if you can see the motherboard itself—either through a case window or by opening up your PC—it will have the make and model printed on it in a prominent position, usually somewhere around the center. If none of the other methods listed here have helped you identify the motherboard you’ve got, try and get a look at it.
