| A | B |
|---|
| bus | An electrical conductor that makes |
| data bus | a bidirectional pathway linking the cpu to memory and i/o devices |
| address bus | a pathway that carries data generated by the CPU to the various meomory and I/o elements of the computer |
| pc bus | the bus architectures used in the first ibm pc's, originally an 8-bit bus expanded to a 16-bit bus |
| isa | A bus standard for IBM compatibles that extends the XT bus architecture to 16 bits. It also allows for bus mastering although only the first 16 MB of main memory is available for direct access. In reference to the XT bus architecture it is sometimes referred to as "AT bus architecture" |
| eisa | A bus standard for IBM compatibles that extends the ISA bus architecture to 32 bits and allows more than one CPU to share the bus. The bus mastering support is also enhanced to provide access to 4 GB of memory. Unlike MCA, EISA can accept older XT bus architecture and ISA boards |
| pci | peripheral component interconnect, high performance 32-64 bit bus |
| plug and play | This is a standard that was supposed to make adding peripherials to your system easier |
| bandwidth | A measure, in some ammount of bits per second, of the amount of data that can be sent over a particular cable, interface, or bus |
| bus master | Any class of micro processor unit with the ability to take control of the system buses of a computer |
| bus speed | A measurement, usually in mhz, of how many times datacab be transferred over the bus per second |
| expansion slot | refers to any type of slot in a computer that you can plug an expansion card into |
| legacy | A gift of personal property by will |
| firewire | High Performance Serial Bus |
| adapter | A hardware device, such as a printed circuit board, that enables a personal computer to use additional peripheral devices or hardware |
| interrupt | A circuit that conveys a signal stopping the execution of a running program |
| jumper | a small connector used to make temporary electrical connections |
| dma | A facility of some architectures which allows a peripheral to read and write memory without intervention by the CPU. ___ is a limited form of bus mastering |
| io adress | on PC's, a three-digit hexadecimal number (2AB, SAO, and so on) used to identify and signal a peripheral device like a serial port, parallel port, or sound card |
| agp | accellerated graphics port, based on PCI architecture is desgned specifically to speed up 3d graphics |
