A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z

IDE - ISA

IDE - Standard in almost any PC, the IDE (Integrated Device Electronics) interface is what we common use for connecting hard drives and optical devices (CDROMs, etc.) to a PC.

Integer - An integer is any whole number on the number line, including its opposite and zero. In the PC world, integers in the computer world are handled much faster than floating-point numbers, however they aren't precise enough for some functions in programming.

Internal Rendering - The colors a video card will render an image at before displaying it on the monitor is its internal rendering quality. It is usually set at either one of these three: 16-bit (2^16 colors), 24-bit (2^24 colors), or 32-bit (2^32 colors). A higher color depth usually means a game will look much better, yet loss in speed and framerate usually occur. Although most older games were 16-bit only, most modern games do support an optional (and sometimes required) 32-bit internal rendering.

I/O Connector - I/O stands for Input/Output. An I/O connector or port refers to a device in which other devices can be added. Two examples, are the AGP port for video cards (output) and the USB mouse (input).

IRQ - Stands for Interrupt Request, which is basically how videocards/soundcards and other devices dependent upon the CPU 'line up' waiting to access the CPU's cycles in order to be processed. No two devices can access the CPU on the same IRQ unless specifically designed to work with each other.

ISA - Stands for Industry Standard Architecture. This is an expansion bus similar to PCI in concept, but it's much older. It runs at about 8MHz and offers a home for some low bandwidth devices such as soundcards, modems, or network cards. ISA is practically extinct today, and has been replaced by PCI as the new standard. a target="_top" href="http://v.extreme-dm.com/?login=dgrampa">

Next Page