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cached. However, only 512KB of this memory will be in the cache at any given
moment. Any main memory above 512MB could never be cached.
Closed and open jumpers Jumpers and jumper pins are active when they
are On or Closed, and inactive when they are Off or Open.
CMOS Complementary Metal-Oxide Semiconductors are chips that hold the
basic start-up information for the BIOS.
The COM port is another name for the serial port, which is so-called
because it transmits the eight bits of a byte of data along one wire, and
receives data on another single wire (that is, the data is transmitted in serial
form, one bit after another). Parallel ports transmit the bits of a byte on eight
different wires at the same time (that is, in parallel form, eight bits at the same
time).
DIMM Dual In-line Memory Modules are a faster and more capacious form
of RAM than SIMMs, and do not need to be installed in pairs.
DIMM bank DIMM banks are sometimes called DIMM sockets, because
the physical slot and the logical unit are the same. That is, one DIMM
module fits into one DIMM socket, which is capable of acting as a memory
bank.
DMA Direct Memory Access channels are similar to IRQs. DMA channels
allow hardware devices (like sound cards or keyboards) to access the main
memory without involving the CPU. This frees up CPU resources for other
tasks. As with IRQs, it is vital that you do not double up devices on a single
line. Plug and Play devices will take care of this for you.
In Doze mode, only the CPUs speed is slowed.
DRAM Dynamic RAM is a widely available, very affordable form of RAM
which has the unfortunate tendency to lose data if it is not recharged regu-
larly (every few milliseconds). This refresh requirement makes DRAM three to
ten times slower than non-recharged RAM such as SRAM.
EDO RAM (Extended Data-Out RAM) speeds access to memory locations
by assuming that memory addresses are static: the next time it looks for a bit of
Appendix 1
Glossary