What is the main difference between a motherboard you would go out and buy to build a desktop and a motherboard you would buy to build a 24 or more port switch?

Can you give me any brand specifics for what would be a good choice to build a switch with?

You wouldn't build a switch like that. You'd use a backplane. Just google it.

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A MB for a desktop has features usually. Those features tend to include a common cpu type, chipsets for access to audio, video and memory access. They also include access to the back plane.

A network switch is a single purpose device. It has been built to move data. It doesn't support audio, video. You usually can't add or remove memory. You won't have a standard processor. The way the nic's attach to the back plane of a switch is designed to allow maximum traffic between nics or vlans.


It really is like comparing apples to oranges.