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Glossary 209
control panel — The part of the system that contains indicators and controls, such as
the power button and power indicator.
controller — A chip that controls the transfer of data between the processor and
memory or between the processor and a peripheral.
conventional memory — The first 640 KB of RAM. Conventional memory is found in
all systems. Unless they are specially designed, MS-DOS
®
programs are limited to
running in conventional memory.
coprocessor — A chip that relieves the system’s processor of specific processing tasks.
A math coprocessor, for example, handles numeric processing.
CPU — Central processing unit. See processor.
DC — Direct current.
DDR — Double-data rate. A technology in memory modules that potentially doubles
the output.
device driver — A program that allows the operating system or some other program
to interface correctly with a peripheral. Some device drivers—such as network
drivers—must be loaded from the config.sys file or as memory-resident programs
(usually, from the autoexec.bat file). Others must load when you start the program for
which they were designed.
DHCP — Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol. A method of automatically
assigning an IP address to a client system.
diagnostics — A comprehensive set of tests for your system.
DIMM — Dual in-line memory module. See also memory module.
DIN — Deutsche Industrie Norm.
directory — Directories help keep related files organized on a disk in a hierarchical,
“inverted tree” structure. Each disk has a “root” directory. Additional directories that
branch off the root directory are called subdirectories. Subdirectories may contain
additional directories branching off them.