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SAS — Serial-attached SCSI.

SATA — Serial Advanced Technology Attachment. A standard interface between the system board and storage devices.

SCSI — Small computer system interface. An I/O bus interface with faster data transmission rates than standard ports.

SDRAM — Synchronous dynamic random-access memory.

sec — Second(s).

SEL — System event log. Used in the system management software to record system events and errors.

serial port — An I/O port used most often to connect a modem to your system. You can usually identify a serial port on your system by its 9-pin connector.

service tag — A bar code label on the system used to identify it when you call Dell for technical support.

simple disk volume — The volume of free space on a single dynamic, physical disk.

SMART — Self-Monitoring Analysis and Reporting Technology. Allows hard drives to report errors and failures to the system BIOS and then display an error message on the screen.

SMP — Symmetric multiprocessing. Used to describe a system that has two or more processors connected via a high-bandwidth link and managed by an operating system, where each processor has equal access to I/O devices.

SNMP — Simple Network Management Protocol. A standard interface that allows a network manager to remotely monitor and manage workstations.

spanning — Spanning, or concatenating, disk volumes combines unallocated space from multiple disks into one logical volume, allowing more efficient use of all the space and all drive letters on a multiple-disk system.

striping — Disk striping writes data across three or more disks in an array, but only uses a portion of the space on each disk. The amount of space used by a "stripe" is the same on each disk used. A virtual disk may use several stripes on the same set of disks in an array. See also guarding, mirroring, and RAID.

SVGA — Super video graphics array. VGA and SVGA are video standards for video adapters with greater resolution and color display capabilities than previous standards.

system board — As the main circuit board, the system board usually contains most of your system’s integral components, such as the processor, RAM, controllers for peripherals, and various ROM chips.

system configuration information — Data stored in memory that tells a system what hardware is installed and how the system should be configured for operation.

system diskette — See bootable diskette.

system memory — See RAM.

System Setup program — A BIOS-based program that allows you to configure your system’s hardware and customize the system’s operation by setting features such as password protection. Because the System Setup program is stored in NVRAM, any settings remain in effect until you change them again.

system.ini file — A start-up file for the Windows operating system. When you start Windows, it consults the system.ini file to determine a variety of options for the Windows operating environment. Among other things, the system.ini file records which video, mouse, and keyboard drivers are installed for Windows.

TCP/IP — Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol.

termination — Some devices (such as the last device at each end of a SCSI cable) must be terminated to prevent reflections and spurious signals in the cable. When such devices are connected in a series, you may need to enable or disable the termination on these devices by changing jumper or switch settings on the devices or by changing settings in the configuration software for the devices.

Glossary