A Glossary on Computer Hardware

IEEE 1394 is also known as fire wire. It is a standard used on digital video
1394 (IEEE)
cameras for capturing footage as digital video

A Ampere. A unit of electricity.

ACPI Advanced Configuration and Power Interface

ADSL Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line

AGP Accelerated Graphics Port

AMD Advanced Micro Devices: a manufacturer of CPU's and other devices

AMD64 AMD's 64-bit technology (see AMD)

APIC Advanced Programmable Interrupt Controller

APM Advanced Power Management

American Standard Code for Information Inter-change: a Digital code for

ASCII
printed characters

ATA Advanced Technology Attachment

ATAPI Advanced Technology Attachement Packet Interface

Athlon A CPU made by AMD (Advanced Micro Devices)

Binary A number system using two digits: a 0 and a 1

BIOS Basic Input/Output System

A specification for wireless communication of data and voice information.

Bluetooth Based on a low-cost short-range radio link it provides protected ad-hoc
connections for mobile and stationary communication environments.

Bus or System Bus A way to transmit data from one component to another

Cache A repository for temporary storage of data likely to be used again.

CAS Column Address Strobe

CD ROM Compact Disk: Read Only Memory

Celeron A low cost CPU manufactured by Intel

Complementary Metal Oxide Semiconductor: A chip able to operate from a

CMOS
small amount of electricity provided by a battery.

CPU Central Processing Unit

CRT Refers to the traditional style of monitor. CRT stands for Cathode Ray Tube

DDR (RAM) Double Data Rate Random Access Memory

DIMM Dual Inline Memory Module

DMA Direct Memory Access

Duron AMD Processor

DVD Digital Versatile Disk

DVI Digital Video Interface

Ethernet See LAN

File Allocation Table (can be 16 or 32bit). This was the standard file
FAT
systems used with Win9x and ME

FDD Floppy Disk Drive

Firmware Computer instructions which are permanently stored in the circuitry.

FLOPs Floating Operations Per second

FPU Floating Point Unit

FSB Front Side Bus

GB Gigabyte (1024MB = 1GB)

Ghz Gigahertz (1000mhz = 1ghz)

Gigabyte See GB

GPU Graphics Processing Unit

GUI Graphical User Interface (pronounced gooey)

HDD Hard Disk Drive

Hyper Transport technology is a high-speed, low latency, point-to-point link

designed to increase the communication speed between integrated circuits
HT in computers, servers, embedded systems, and networking and
telecommunications equipment up to 48 times faster than some existing
technologies.

This is a common wiring point used to network computers together, allowing

Hub information to be distributed through one location to any other computer
connected to the network.

Hz Hertz

Input/Output. Usually used to describe the flow of information to and from

I/O
the CPU.

IDE Integrated/Intelligent Drive Electronics

IEEE Institute of Electronics and Electrical Engineers

Intel Manufacturer of popular Pentium processors

IP Internet Protocol

IP Address A number that uniquely identifies your computer on the internet

IRC Internet Relay Chat

IRQ Interrupt Request Line

ISA Industry Standard Architecture

ISDN Integrated Services Digital Network

ISO International Organization for Standardization

ISP Internet Service Provider

IT Information Technology

KB Kilobyte (1024Bytes = 1KB)

Kbps Kilobits Per Second

Kilobyte See KB

LAN Local Area Network

LCD Liquid Crystal Display

LED Light Emitting Diode

Media Access Control address, a hardware address that uniquely identifies

MAC Address
each node of a network.

MB Megabyte (1024KB = 1MB)

Megabyte See MB

MHz Megahertz (1000 hz = 1mhz)

MODulator/DEModulator converts digital to analog and vice versa for

MODEM
communication between computers.

Motherboard The main circuit board that other computer components plug into.

Network Address Translation. Secure method of giving "private" IP

NAT
addresses to equipment on a network. Uses only 1 public IP address.

NIC Network Interface Card

Node In networks, a processing location

OCR Optical Character Recognition

Original Equipment Manufacturer, this is a brand name PC (i.e. HP, Dell,

OEM
Compaq, etc.)

OLED Organic Light Emitting Diode

P4 Pentium 4 processor

The parallel port is a 25-pin RS-232C connector. It is also know as the

Parallel Port Printer port and transfers information 8x faster than a Serial Port (see Serial
Port)

PCB Printed Circuit Board

PCI Peripheral Component Interconnect

PCM Pulse Code Modulation

PCMCIA Personal Computer Memory Card International Association

PDA Personal Digital Assistant

PnP Plug and Play

POST Power On Self Test (as in POST screen when your computer boots)

PPPoE Point to Point Protocol over Ethernet

PSU Power Supply Unit

RAID Redundant Array of Independent Disks

RAM Random Access Memory

Random Access Memory Digital-to-Analog Converter: RAMDAC is a

microchip that resides on a VGA card. This translates digital information into
RAMDAC an analog signal that your monitor can interpret. The faster the RAMDAC
(MHz) the larger the refresh rates your graphics card will support at each
resolution.

RAS Row Address Strobe

RGB Red, Green & Blue

ROM Read Only Memory

A router "routes" information from a LAN (see LAN) to a phone line. Routers
Router can also handle errors, produce stats and can determine whether a user is
authorized or not.

S.M.A.R.T. Self-Monitoring Analysis & Reporting Technology

S/PDIF Sony/Philips Digital Interface

SATA Serial Advanced Technology Attachment

SCSI Small Computer Systems Interface (pronounced scuzzy)

SD (RAM) Synchronous Dynamic Random Access Memory

Sempron Advanced Micro Devices' Budget CPU (see AMD)

Also known as a COM or RS-232 port. This is a 9 pin port usually featured
Serial Port
on most ATX motherboards.

SLI Scalable link interface

SVGA Super Video Graphics Array

Is similar to a Hub (see Hub) but is more intelligent as it can sort and
Switch
distribute data packages according to the device it came from.

System Bus See Bus

TB Terabyte (1024GB = 1TB)

TCP/IP Transfer Control Protocol / Internet Protocol

Acronym for Technology Without An Interesting Name! This is an OCR

TWAIN
Standard.

UPS Uninterruptible Power Supply

Universal Serial Bus. A standard connection allowing easy connectivity for

USB
external devices

V Volt. A unit of electricity.

VDU Visual Display Unit

VGA Video Graphics Array

VOIP Voice Over IP (see IP)

Virtual Private Network, a network that is constructed by using public wires

VPN
to connect nodes.

W Watt. A unit of electricty.

WAN Wide Area Network

Wireless Fidelity: A name decided by the Wi-Fi Alliance to describe wireless

WiFi
local area networks.

WLAN Wireless Local Area Network

WYSIWYG What You See Is What You Get

XGA Extended Graphics Array