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Glossary 179
Glossary
Terms in this Glossary are provided for
informational purposes only and may or may not
describe features included with your particular
computer.
A
AC — alternating current — The form of electricity that
powers your computer when you plug the AC adapter
power cable in to an electrical outlet.
ACPI — advanced configuration and power interface —
A power management specification that enables
Microsoft
®
Windows
®
operating systems to put a
computer in standby or hibernate mode to conserve the
amount of electrical power allocated to each device
attached to the computer.
AGP — accelerated graphics port — A dedicated graphics
port that allows system memory to be used for video-
related tasks. AGP delivers a smooth, true-color video
image because of the faster interface between the video
circuitry and the computer memory.
AHCI — Advanced Host Controller Interface — An
interface for a SATA hard drive Host Controller which
allows the storage driver to enable technologies such as
Native Command Queuing (NCQ) and hot plug.
ALS — ambient light sensor.
antivirus software — A program designed to identify,
quarantine, and/or delete viruses from your computer.
ASF — alert standards format — A standard to define a
mechanism for reporting hardware and software alerts to a
management console. ASF is designed to be independent
of the platform and operating system.
B
battery life span — The length of time (years) during
which a portable computer battery is able to be depleted
and recharged.
battery operating time — The length of time (minutes or
hours) that a portable computer battery powers the
computer.
BD — Blu-ray Disc™ — An optical disc format meant for
high definition video (HD) and high density data storage.
BD-R — BD recordable — A recordable version of a BD.
Data can be recorded only once onto a BD-R. Once
recorded, the data cannot be erased or written over.
BD-RE — BD rewritable — A rewritable version of a BD.
Data can be written to a BD-RE disc, and then erased and
written over (rewritten).
BD-RE drive — An optical drive that can read and write
to CDs, DVDs, and BDs.
BIOS — basic input/output system — A program (or
utility) that serves as an interface between the computer
hardware and the operating system. Unless you
understand what effect these settings have on the
computer, do not change them. Also referred to as system
setup.
bit — The smallest unit of data interpreted by your
computer.
Bluetooth
®
wireless technology — A wireless technology
standard for short-range (9 m [29 feet]) networking
devices that allows for enabled devices to automatically
recognize each other.
boot sequence — Specifies the order of the devices from
which the computer attempts to boot.
bootable media — Media, such as a floppy disk or CD,
that you can use to start your computer. In case your hard
drive is damaged or your computer has a virus, ensure that
you always have bootable media available. Your Drivers
and Utilities disc is bootable media.
book.book Page 179 Tuesday, February 13, 2007 1:50 PM