ISA and PCI Expansion Buses

Your computer includes expansion buses for two types of option cards: ISA and PCI. The PCI bus provides extremely fast data transfer (33 MHz) for up to two high-performance PCI cards, such as high-speed video cards. PCI cards use plug and play technology that automatically configures resources used by the card, such as interrupt requests and memory addresses.

The ISA bus transfers data at 8.33 MHz for up to three 16-bit ISA option cards. You can use these slots for standard ISA cards such as fax/ modem cards, sound cards, and SCSI (Small Computer System Interface) cards.

System and video BIOS

The computer’s system and video BIOS are contained in a flash memory device on the main system board, which you can upgrade without replacing the chip.

Your computer supports shadowing of the system and video BIOS to allow BIOS routines to run from fast, 32-bit RAM instead of from the slower, S-bit flash device.

How to Use This Manual

This manual contains the information you need to get the best results from your computer. You don’t have to read everything; see the following chapter summaries to find the sections you need.

If you are reading the manual online, click on the highlighted words below to skip to the section you want to read.

I n t r o d u c t i o n 3