Disk

The collective term for diskettes and hard disks.

Disk drive

The physical device that allows the computer to read from and write to a disk. A diskette drive has a disk slot into which you insert a diskette. A hard disk is sealed inside a protective unit.

Diskette

A flat piece of flexible plastic coated with magnetic material used to store data permanently.

Display adapter card

A circuit board that can be installed in one of the computer’s option slots to provide the monitor interface. The display adapter card controls the way the monitor displays text and graphics. Also known as Video card. (In the Equity 386SX PLUS, a VGA display adapter is built into the system board.)

DOS

Disk Operating System. A commonly used operating system that controls the computer’s input and output functions. See Operating system.

Double-density

A type of diskette format that allows you to store twice as much data as the standard-density format. A 5 ‘/,-inch double-density diskette can store 360KB of data. A 3 ‘/z-inch double-density diskette can store 720KB of data.

Drive designator

The letter name of a disk drive, followed by a colon-for example, C :.

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