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10Base2 | The 10Base-2 standard (Thinnet) uses 50 ohm coaxial cable with maximum lengths of 185 meters. This cable is thinner and more flexible than that used for the 10Base-5 standard. Cables in the 10Base-2 system connect with BNC connectors. The Network Interface Card (NIC) in a computer requires a T-connector where you can attach two cables to adjacent computers. Any unused connection must have a 50 ohm terminator.
| | 10baseT | A version of Ethernet in which stations are attached by twisted pair cable, the traditional cables used for telephone lines. 10BaseT uses a star formation, and transmits at 10 megabits per second.
| | ADAPTER | A part that connects two devices or systems, physically or electrically, and enables them to work together. It can be a plug that allows two wires to be connected, for example, or a printed circuit board that modifies the computer so it can work with certain hardware or software.
| | ADSL | Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line, or Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Loop. A digital subscriber line (DSL) technology in which the transmission of data from server to client is much faster than the transmission from client to server. Whereas with HDSL (High-Speed Digital Subscriber Line), transmission is 784 kbp in both directions, with ADSL, the rate from client to server is 640 kilobytes per second and from server to client can be up to 6 megabits per second. This kind of connection is useful with applications such as interactive TV and Video on Demand, because the data the server sends is much more than the data sent by the client. ADSL uses bandwidth that is not used by voice; therefore voice and data can be transmitted at the same time.
| | API | Abbreviation of application program interface, a set of routines, protocols, and tools for building software applications. A good API makes it easier to develop a program by providing all the building blocks. A programmer puts the blocks together.
| | ARPANET | Advanced Research Projects Agency Network. A wide area network developed in the 1960s by the Advanced Research Projects Agency of the U.S. Department of Defense, that linked government sites, academic research sites, and industrial sites around the world. Later, the military communications part split off and was named MILNET. ARPANET was the testing ground and original backbone of the Internet.
| | AT | Advanced Technology. An IBM PC introduced in 1984 that was the most advanced PC at that time, with an Intel 80286 processor, 16-bit bus, and 1.2MB floppy drive.
| | ATAPI | AT Attachment Packet Interface, an extension to EIDE that enables the interface to support CD-ROM players and tape drives.
| | ATX | The modern-day shape and layout of PC motherboards. It improves on the previous standard, the Baby AT form factor, by rotating the orientation of the board 90 degrees. This allows for a more efficient design, with disk drive cable connectors nearer to the drive bays and the CPU closer to the power supply and cooling fan.
| | AUI | Attachment Unit Interface, the portion of the Ethernet standard that specifies how a cable is to be connected to an Ethernet card. AUI specifies a coaxial cable connected to a transceiver that plugs into a 15-pin socket on the network interface card (NIC).
| | AWG | American Wire Gauge.
| | BAUD RATE | The number of signaling elements that occur each second.
| | BIOS | Stands for Basic Input/Output System. A set of instructions stored on a ROM chip inside IBM PCs and PC-compatibles, which handles all input-output functions and controls how your PC starts up, and stores information about which devices are attached to it in the CMOS memory.
| | BIT | Short for binary digit. The smallest unit of information a computer can hold. The value of a bit is 1 or 0.
| | BNC | Short form for British Naval Connector or Bayonet Nut Connector or Bayonet Neill Concelman. It is a type of connector used with coaxial cables such as the RG-58 A/U cable used with the 10Base-2 Ethernet system. The basic BNC connector is a male type mounted at each end of a cable. This connector has a center pin connected to the center cable conductor and a metal tube connected to the outer cable shield. A rotating ring outside the tube locks the cable to any female connector.
| | BNC T | BNC T-connectors are female devices for connecting two cables to a network interface card. A BNC barrel connector allows connecting two cables together.
| | BUFFER | A reserved area of memory for temporarily holding data. A buffer can hold data being sent from a high-speed device to a low-speed device until the slower device can accept the input; for example, to hold data sent to a printer until the printer is ready for it.
| | BUS | A set of conductors which connect the functional units in a computer. It is called a bus because it travels to all destinations. There are local busses that connect elements within the CPU and busses which connect the computer to external memory and peripherals. The bus width determines the speed of data transmission. Most personal computers use 32-bit busses both internally and externally. Internal busses are configured in parallel; there are also serial busses between computers in networks.
| | BYTE | The standard measurement of storage capacity. A byte is made up of eight bits, which is pretty much the same as eight characters. One thousand bytes is equal to a kilobyte (KB). One million bytes is equal to a megabyte (MB). One billion bytes is a gigabyte (GB). These figures are actually approximate. A kilobyte is really 1024 bytes, etc. These numbers are typically rounded off to the nearest thousand, million, or billion.
| | CABLE | A flexible wire or bundle of wires, usually metal (glass or silica in fiber optic cable), insulated with plastic or rubber, and having connectors on the ends. Some kinds of cable, especially coaxial cable and fiber optics cable, are used in electronics and computer networking.
| | CACHE | A temporary storage area for frequently-accessed or recently-accessed data. Having certain data stored in cache speeds up the operation of the computer. There are two kinds of cache: internal (or memory cache) and external (or disk cache). Internal cache is built into the CPU, and external cache is on the motherboard. When an item is called for, the computer first checks the internal cache, then the external cache, and finally the slower main storage. A cache hit (accessing data from a cache) takes much less time than retrieving information from the main memory; the cache has high-speed memory chips. The cache may also be used as a temporary storage area for data that will be written to disk when the computer is idle.
| | CATEGORY 5 | Category 5 describes network cabling that consists of four twisted pairs of copper wire terminated by RJ45 connectors. Category 5 cabling supports frequencies up to 100 MHz and speeds up to 100 Mbps.
| | CDROM | Compact Disc Read-Only Memory. An optical disk that is physically the same as an audio CD, but contains computer data. Storage capacity is about 680 megabytes. CD-ROMs are interchangeable between different types of computers.
| | CENTRONICS | A standard interface for connecting printers and other parallel devices. For PCs, almost all parallel ports conform to the Centronics standard. Two new parallel port standards that are backward compatible with Centronics, but offer faster transmission rates, are ECP (Extend Capabilities Port) and EPP (Enhanced Parallel Port).
| | CFM | Cubic feet per minute, the measure of air flow, representing how much air is displaced in 1 minute.
| | CMOS | Complementary Metal Oxide Semiconductor. A kind of integrated circuit used in a bit of memory on your motherboard that contains configuration information about your computer.
| | COAXIAL CABLE | A cable consisting of a single conductor which is surrounded by insulation and a conductive shield. The shield usually is connected to an electrical ground and prevents the cable from picking up or emitting electrical noise. Coaxial cable is used in communications.
| | COM PORT | A serial communications port.
| | CONDUCTOR | A material through which electrical current can flow.
| | CPU | Central Processing Unit. The CPU controls the operation of a computer. Units within the CPU perform arithmetic and logical operations and decode and execute instructions. In microcomputers, the entire CPU is on a single chip.
| | CSMA/CD | Carrier Sense, Multiple Access, Collision Detection. Ethernet packets are transmitted using CSMA/CD, which means the sending computer waits for the line to be free before sending a message, then sends; if two computers accidentally transmit at the same time and their messages collide, they wait and send again at different times.
| | DAISY CHAIN | A type of cabling configuration in which devices are connected along a continuous line.
| | DDC | Short form for Display Data Channel. It is a VESA standard for communication between a monitor and a video adapter. Using DDC, a monitor can inform the video card about its properties, such as maximum resolution and color depth. The video card can then use this information to ensure that the user is presented with valid options for configuring the display.
| | DECnet | A network protocol from Digital Equipment Corporation, which can interconnect PDP, VAX, PC, and Macintosh computers.
| | DEVICE DRIVER | A device driver is a program that extends the operating system to support a device such as a disk or tape drive; or a program that enables an application to use a device such as a printer. Hardware devices such as sound cards, printers, scanners, and CD-ROM drives must each have the proper driver installed in order to run.
| | DHCP | Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol. Windows NT Server software that assigns an IP address to each node in a network.
| | DIN | Stands for Deutsche Industrinorm, the standards -setting organization for Germany. A DIN connector is a connector that conforms to one of the many standards defined by DIN. DIN connectors are used in keyboard connectors for PCs.
| | DMA | Direct Memory Access/Addressing. A method of transferring data from one memory area to another without having to go through the central processing unit.
| | DNS | Domain Name System. A database system that translates an IP address into a domain name. For example, a numeric address like 232.452.120.54 can become something like xyz.com
| | DOMAIN NAME | An Internet address in alphabetic form. Domain names must have at least 2 parts: the part on the left which names the organization, and the part on the right which identifies the highest subdomain, such as the country (fr for France, uk for United Kingdom) or the type of organization (com for commercial; edu for educational, etc.). Directory levels can be indicated in other parts. The IP address is translated into the domain name by the domain name server.
| | DOS | Acronym for disk operating system. The term DOS can refer to any operating system, but it is most often used as a shorthand for MS-DOS (Microsoft disk operating system). Originally developed by Microsoft for IBM, MS-DOS was the standard operating system for IBM-compatible personal computers.
| | DOT MATRIX PRINTER | The workhorse of the computer industry, the dot matrix printer has been around for years and years. They're very reliable and fast, but the print quality often leaves something to be desired. They work by using a matrix of pins to form the letters, which press through a ribbon to form characters on the paper. One big advantage of dot matrix printers is their ability to easily handle multi-part forms. They're used often at point-of-sale terminals. Many cash registers employ small dot matrix printers.
| | DPI | Dots per inch is the standard measurement of printer resolution. A printer (unless it's a plotter) lays down a character as a series of dots. It stands to reason that the more dots you can cram into an inch of space, the better your text will look. This is also called resolution.The more dots per inch, the higher the resolution: 600 dpi would mean 600 x 600 = 360,000 dots per square inch
| | DSL | Digital Subscriber Line or Digital Subscriber Loop. A way of sending digital data over regular copper telephone lines. It is also called High-Speed DSL (HDSL).
| | DVI | Short for Digital Visual Interface, a digital interface standard created by the Digital Display Working Group (DDWG) to convert analog signals into digital signals to accommodate both analog and digital monitors. Data is transmitted using the transition minimized differential signaling (TMDS) protocol, providing a digital signal from the source's graphics subsystem to the display. The standard specifies a single plug and connector that encompass both the new digital and legacy VGA interfaces, as well as a digital-only plug connector. DVI handles bandwidths in excess of 160 MHz and thus supports UXGA and HDTV with a single set of links. Higher resolutions can be supported with a dual set of links. Utilized in both PC and Home theatre applications. | | ECP | Enhanced Capabilities Port. A high-speed enhanced parallel port from Microsoft.
| | EEPROM | Electrically Erasable Programmable Read Only Memory. A memory chip that can be recorded or erased electrically, but that does not lose its content when electrical power is removed. It is called ROM even though it can be recorded, because it takes a lot longer to record than RAM and is only practical for recording data which is not changed often.
| | EIA | Electronics Industries Association. An organization which establishes Recommended Standards (RS) for hardware devices and their interfaces. RS-232 is a well-known standard for transmitting serial data by wire.
| | EIDE | Enhanced Integrated Drive Electronics. A hardware interface which is faster than IDE, allows more memory, and can connect up to four devices (such as hard drives, tape drives, and CD-ROM drives) to the computer.
| | EPP | Enhanced Parallel Port. A high-speed transfer parallel port that can support several devices in a daisy chain formation.
| | ETHERNET | The most popular type of local area network, which sends its communications through radio frequency signals carried by a coaxial cable. Each computer checks to see if another computer is transmitting and waits its turn to transmit. If two computers accidentally transmit at the same time and their messages collide, they wait and send again in turn. Software protocols used by Ethernet systems vary, but include Novell Netware and TCP/IP.
| | FAN | A cooling device that circulates air in a computer; fans are necessary to keep the computer from overheating.
| | FCC | Federal Communications Commission. A U.S. government agency that regulates interstate and foreign communications. The FCC sets rates for communications services; determines standards for equipment; and controls broadcast licensing.
| | FIBER OPTICS(FO) | The transmission of data in the form of pulses of light. Fiber optics uses cables containing glass or silica fibers no thicker than a human hair. There is very little signal loss, and information can be transmitted at high speed over long distances. Fiber optic cables do not have problems with external noise like wire cables do, and are better for transmissions requiring security.
| | FIFO | First In First Out. A method of storage in which the data stored for the longest time will be retrieved first.
| | FIREWIRE | The former name for High Performance Serial Bus. A serial bus developed by Apple Computer and Texas Instruments (IEEE 1394). The High Performance Serial Bus can connect up to 63 devices in a tree-like daisy chain configuration, and transmit data at up to 400 megabits per second. It supports plug and play and peer-to-peer communication between peripheral devices.
| | FLOPPY DRIVE | Today's standard floppy drive is 3.5" and holds 1.44 megabytes of data. Floppies can also come in 5.25" sizes and other capacities. Floppies are the most common portable method of data storage. They can be used to move data from one computer to another, for backup purposes, or for distribution of software. Floppy drives may one day be supplanted by removable drives.
| | FTP | File Transfer Protocol. A client/server protocol for exchanging files with a host computer. Examples are Xmodem, Ymodem, Zmodem and Kermit.
| | FULL DUPLEX | A communications channel which transmits data in both directions at once.
| | HALF DUPLEX | A communications channel which transmits data in either direction, but only one direction at a time.
| | HARD DRIVE(HDD) | The most common form of permanent data storage for your system, it consists of special magnetically-coated platters designed to store mass quantities of data. New on the market are Ultra DMA hard drives. Ultra DMA hard drives have a faster access time, but require that your motherboard supports this standard. It won't, however, hurt to put a UDMA drive on a system that doesn't support it. It will work like a standard hard drive. And if you should decide to upgrade you motherboard later, you'll have a drive that's ready for it.
| | HDMI | HDMI stands for High-Definition Multimedia Interface, and like DVI, it allows for the uncompressed data transfer of video between a digital TV and HDMI-enabled consumer electronics devices. The big difference between HDMI and DVI is that HDMI transfers the video and audio signal. DVI only carries the video signal. According to the HDMI’s official Web site, the advantages of HDMI are: 1) The highest quality video seen and audio heard
2) Fewer cables behind the TV means less mess and confusion-free connection
3) Automatically configures remote controls of devices connected by HDMI
4) Automatically adjusts video content to most effective format
5) HDMI is compatible with DVI, which means it will allow connection to PCs | | HUB | Like the hub of a wheel, a central device that connects several computers together or several networks together. A passive hub may simply forward messages; an active hub, or repeater, amplifies or refreshes the stream of data, which otherwise would deteriorate over a long distance.
| | HVD | High Voltage Differential, also called Differential. A type of SCSI signal. An HVD SCSI system provides reliable signaling in high noise environments over a long bus length (up to 25m [82ft]). HVD hardware cannot be mixed with other SCSI signal types. A Differential bus requires Differential terminators. Less than 5% of all SCSI hardware uses HVD signaling.
| | I/O | Input/Output. Transfer of data into a computer, and from the computer to the outside world.
| | I/O ADDRESS | Input/Output address. A unique address given to a peripheral device for input and output; on a PC, the I/O address is in the form of a three-digit hexademical number.
| | I/O DEVICE | Input/Output device. A device that is used to transfer data into or out of the computer; also called peripheral device.
| | ICQ (I SEEK YOU) | A chat program from Mirabilis for Windows 95. It can be set to notify the user when friends are online; it seeks out friends of the user so messages and files can be exchanged.
| | IDE | Integrated Drive Electronics preceded EIDE on the market. IDE has a slower transfer rate, and will only allow two devices to be connected to the interface at one time.
| | IEEE | Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers. A worldwide professional association for electrical and electronics engineers, which sets standards for telecommunications and computing applications.
| | INJEKT PRINTER | The inkjet printer, as its name implies, makes an image by spraying tiny jets of ink onto the paper. Until recently, the resolution on inkjet printers could not come close to laser printers, but technology has brought resolution up and prices down. For most color work, and inkjet printer is a good investment. Artists may want to look into a color laser or other type of printer. They're higher in cost, but the quality is far superior.
| | INTERNET | The biggest internet in the world. This worldwide information highway is comprised of thousands of interconnected computer networks, and reaches millions of people in many different countries. The Internet was originally developed for the United States military, and then became used for government, academic and commercial research and communications. The Internet is made up of large backbone networks (such as MILNET, NSFNET, and CREN), and smaller networks that link to them. The U.S. National Science Foundation maintains a major part of the backbone (NSFNET). The Internet functions as a gateway for electronic mail between various networks and online services. The World Wide Web facility on the Internet makes possible almost instantaneous exchange of information by linking documents around the world. Internet computers use the TCP/IP (Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol). There are over six million hosts on the Internet: mainframes, minicomputers or workstations that support the Internet Protocol. The Internet is connected to computer networks worldwide that use various message formats and protocols; gateways convert these formats between networks so that the Internet functions as one big network. UNIX utilities such as FTP, Archie, Telnet, Gopher and Veronica have been widely used to access the Internet. The Internet sometimes appears to be amorphous and unregulated, but there are several administrative bodies: the Internet Architecture Board, which oversees technology and standards; the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority, which assigns numbers for ports and sockets, etc.; InterNIC, which assigns Internet addresses; the Internet Engineering and Planning Group, Internet Engineering Steering Group, and the Internet Society.
| | INTERRUPT REQUEST LINE(IRQ) | As you may have discovered, it's possible for PC devices to live in the same virtual space, and when they do, they tend to interfere with each other. By setting each device to a different interrrupt request line, either 8 or 16, you can avoid nasty conflicts such as frozen mice or a out-of-control sound cards. Plug-and-Play technology is one step toward eliminating the hassle of setting IRQ's.
| | INTRANET | A local area network which may not be connected to the Internet, but which has some similar functions. Some organizations set up World Wide Web servers on their own internal networks so employees have access to the organization's Web documents.
| | IP | Internet Protocol. The IP part of TCP/IP; the protocol that is used to route a data packet from its source to its destination over the Internet.
| | IPX | Internetwork Packet Exchange. A Novell NetWare protocol for delivering messages in datagram format.
| | IPX/SPX | Internet Packet Exchange/Sequenced Packet Exchange. IPX is a Novell communications protocol used by NetWare clients and servers to deliver messages within and between networks. SPX ensures reliable delivery of complete messages.
| | ISA BUS | ISA stands for Industry Standard Architecture, and it was the original 8-bit bus for IBM and compatible computers. Now the ISA bus is 16-bits. Many peripheral cards still conform to ISA standards, though many are moving to PCI.
| | ISDN | Stands for Integrated Services Digital Network. An ISDN line can deliver speeds of up to 128 kbps. ISDN requires installation of a digital line to the home or office and an ISDN adapter in the computer.
| | ISO | International Organization for Standardization. A voluntary organization founded in 1946, comprised of the national standards organizations of many countries, and responsible for creating international standards in many areas, including computers and communications. ANSI (American National Standards Institute) is the American member of ISO. ISO produced OSI (Open Systems Interconnection), a seven-layer model for network architecture.
| | JACK | A connector into which a plug is inserted.
| | Kbps | Kilobits per second. Modem speed is generally measured in Kpbs, or Mbps (megabits per second).
| | KEYBOARD | One of the primary peripherals on your system, and one that is likely to wear out long before the rest of your system ever will. The keyboard, along with the mouse, are the primary means of working with your system. If you have Windows 95/98 or NT, you'll want a 104-key keyboard which has access to the Start button and some menu features directly from your keyboard. Shop around for the keyboard that "feels" best. Some have a louder "click" than others, for example. Others, such as the Microsoft Natural Keyboard," are ergonomically designed. Some keyboards may include a built-in pointing device, most all include a 10-key numeric keypad.
| | Kilobytes (Kb) | One thousand bytes is equal to a kilobyte (KB).
| | KVM | Stands for Keyboard-Video-Mouse
| | LAN | Local Area Network. A network that connects computers that are close to each other, usually in the same building, linked by a cable.
| | LASER PRINTER | A laser printer works on the same principal as a copier, but instead of scanning an image on a glass platen, the image is fed from the PC to the drum of the printer. Laser printers are faster - and usually cost more - than inkjet or dot matrix printers. The quality, especially for printed text, is generally better, but inkjet technology is catching up.
| | LED | Light-Emitting Diode. A type of semiconductor diode that emits visible or infrared light when current passes through it. Visible LEDs are used as indicator lights; for example, the light that shows a computer or printer is turned on. Infrared LEDs are used in remote-control devices.
| | LINUX | Pronounced lee-nucks, A freely-distributable implementation of UNIX that runs on a number of hardware platforms, including Intel and Motorola microprocessors. It was developed mainly by Linus Torvalds. Because it's free, and because it runs on many platforms, including PCs, Macintoshes and Amigas, Linux has become extremely popular over the last couple years.
| | LOCAL BUS | An extra bus in addition to the main bus in a computer, which provides a fast data path connecting the CPU with memory and peripherals. The local bus is designed to run at the speed of the CPU. The most common local busses are VLB (VESA Local Bus) and PCI (Peripheral Component Interconnect).
| | LPT | Line Print Terminal. On a personal computer, the usual designation for a parallel port connection to a printer or other device such as a scanner or camera. LPT connections are numbered LPT1, LPT2, LPT3, etc.; most computers have at least one. More parallel ports can be added by installing parallel port adapter cards.
| | LVD | Low Voltage Differential. A type of SCSI signal growing increasing popular. A typical multimode LVD/SE SCSI system provides a moderately long bus length (up to 12m [39ft]) and downward compatibility with Single Ended hardware. LVD-rated equipment is required for "Ultra" SCSI standards.
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ATAPI, ATX, AUI, AWG, BAUD, RATE, BIOS, BIT, BNC, BNC T, BUFFER, BUS, BYTE,
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I/O DEVICE, ICQ (I SEEK YOU) , IDE IEEE, INKJET PRINTER, INTERNET INTERRUPT
REQUEST LINE (IRQ), INTRANET IP, IPX, IPX/SPX, ISA, BUS, ISDN, ISO, JACK, Kbps,
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