The XTAL switch

A clock source connected to the XTAL clock input is used to drive the internal chip clock. The source can be a crystal, a resonator or an external clock signal. The XTAL switch sitting on STK503 selects what is connected to the XTAL pins.

STK500 can supply two different clock signals:

You select between these two sources with the OSCSEL jumper. This signal is available on STK503.

The STK503 also has a socket for a crystal. This socket should be used instead of the one on STK500, at least for high-frequency crystals (>8MHz).

The XTAL switch selects what signal is routed to the XTAL pin on the AVR: