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PC Architecture. A book by Michael B. Karbo

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Fig. 160. The south bridge is part of the chipset, but is supplemented <strong>by</strong> the small Super I/O controller.<br />

Several types of I/O bus<br />

Throughout the years, several different I/O buses have been developed. These are the proper I/O buses:<br />

● The ISA bus – an old, low-speed bus which is not used much any more.<br />

● The MCI, EISA and VL buses – faster buses which are also not used any more.<br />

● The <strong>PC</strong>I bus – a general I/O bus used in more modern <strong>PC</strong>’s.<br />

● The <strong>PC</strong>I Express – the most modern bus.<br />

These ”real” I/O buses are designed for mounting plug-in cards (adapters) inside the actual <strong>PC</strong> box. They therefore connect to<br />

a series of sockets (slots) on the motherboard:<br />

Fig. 161. Plug-in cards are mounted in the I/O slots on the motherboard.<br />

The various I/O buses have gradually replaced each other throughout the <strong>PC</strong>’s history. Motherboards often used to have<br />

several buses, but today basically only the <strong>PC</strong>I bus is used for installing adapters such as network cards, etc.

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