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Glossary
ACPI (Advanced Configuration an d P ower In te rface) : a power management
specification that allows the operating system to control the amount of power
distributed to the computer ’s devices. Devices not in use can be turned off ,
reducing u nnecessary power expendit ure.
AGP (Accelerated Gr ap hics Port): a PCI- based interfac e which was des igned
specifically for demands of 3D graphics applic ations. The 32-bit A G P channel
directly links the graphics controller to the main memory. While the channel runs
only at 66 MHz, it supports data transmission during both the rising and falling
ends of the clock cycle, yieldi ng an effective speed of 133 MHz.
ATAPI (AT Attachment Packet Interface): also known as IDE or ATA; a drive
implementation that includes the disk controller on the device itself. It allows
CD-ROMs and tape drives to be configured as master or slave devices, just like
HDDs.
ATX: the form factor designed to replace the AT form factor. It improves on the
AT design by ro tating the board 90 degrees, so that the IDE connectors are
closer to the drive bays, and the CPU is closer to the power supply and cooling
fan. The keyboard, m ouse, U SB , ser ial, and parallel ports are buil t-in.
Bandwidth: refers to carrying capacity. The gr eater the bandwidth, the mor e
data the bus, phone line, or other electrical path can carry. Greater bandwidth
results in greater speed.
BBS (BIOS Boot Specification): a feature within the BIOS that creates,
prioritiz es, and maintains a list of all Initial Progr am Load (IPL) devic es, and
then stores that list in NVRAM. IPL devices have the ability to load and execut e
an OS, as well as provide the ability to return to the BIOS if the OS load process
fails. At that point, the next IPL device is call ed upon to attempt loading of the
OS.
BIOS (Basi c Input/Output System ): the program that resides in the ROM chip,
which provides the bas ic instructions for controlling your computer’s hardware.
Both the operating system an d application software use BIOS routines to
ensure compatib ility.
Buffer: a portion of RAM whi ch is used to temporarily store data; usually from
an application though it is also used when printing and in most keyboar d drivers.
The CPU can manipul ate data in a buffer be fore copying it to a disk drive. While
this improves system performance (reading to or writin g from a disk drive a
single time is much faster than doing so repeatedly) there is the possibility of