MIDDLE TECHNICAL UNIVERSITY

TECHNICAL ENG. COLLEGE- BAGHDAD

DEPARTMENT OF MCHATRONICS

PC Interface

Prepared By:
Sura Ghanim Hussein

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5.1 The ISA Bus
The ISA, or industry standard architecture, bus has been around since
1982.
In fact, any card from the very first personal computer will plug into and
function in any of the modern Pentium 4-based computers provided they
have an ISA slot.
This is all made possible by the ISA bus interface found in some of these
machines, which is still compatible with the early personal computers.
The ISA bus has disappeared on the home PC, but is still found in many
industrial applications.
The main reason it is still used in industrial application is the low cost of
the interface and the number of existing interface cards. This will
eventually change. 2
5.1 The Peripheral Component Interconnect
(PCI) Bus
The PCI (peripheral component interconnect) bus is virtually the
only bus found in the newest Pentium 4 systems and just about
all the Pentium systems.
In all of the newer systems, the ISA bus still exists by special
order, but as an interface for older 8-bit and 16-bit interface
cards.
Many new systems contain only two ISA bus slots or no ISA slots.
In time, the ISA bus may disappear, but it is still an important
interface for many industrial applications.

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5.1 The Peripheral Component Interconnect
(PCI) Bus
The PCI bus has replaced the VESA local bus. One reason is that the
PCI bus has plug-and-play characteristics and the ability to function
with a 64-bit data bus.
A PCI interface contains a series of registers, located in a small memory
device on the PCI interface, that contain information about the board.
This same memory can provide plug-and-play characteristics to the ISA
bus or any other bus.
The information in these registers allows the computer to automatically
configure the PCI card.
This feature, called plug-and-play (PnP), is probably the main reason
that the PCI bus has become so popular in the most systems.
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5.3 The Parallel Printer Interface (LPT)
The parallel printer interface (LPT) is located on the rear of the
personal computer, and as long as it is a part of the PC, it can be
used as an interface to the PC.
LPT stands for line printer.
The printer interface gives the user access to eight lines that can
be programmed to receive or send parallel data.

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5.4 The Serial COM Ports
The serial communications ports are COM1COM8 in older
systems and may contain any number of ports in modern
systems, but most computers only have COM1 and COM2
installed. Some have a single communication port (COM1).
These ports are controlled and accessed in the DOS environment
with the 16550 serial interface component

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5.5 The Universal Serial Bus (USB)
The universal serial bus (USB) has solved a problem with the personal
computer system.
The current PCI sound cards use the internal PC power supply, which
generates a tremendous amount of noise. Because the USB allows the
sound card to have its own power supply, the noise associated with the
PC power supply can be eliminated, allowing for high-fidelity sound
without 60 Hz hum.
Other benefits are ease of user connection and access to up to 127
different connections through a four-connection serial cable.

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5.5 The Universal Serial Bus (USB)
This interface is ideal for keyboards, sound cards, simple video-retrieval
devices, and modems.
Data transfer speeds are 480 Mbps for full-speed USB 2.0 operation, 11
Mbps for USB 1.1 compliant transfers, and 1.5 Mbps for slow-speed
operation.
Cable lengths are limited to five meters maximum for the full-speed
interface and three meters maximum for the low-speed interface. The
maximum power available through these cables is rated at 100 mA and
maximum current at 5.0 V. If the amount of current exceeds 100 mA,
Windows will display a yellow exclamation point next to the device,
indicating an overload condition.

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5.6 Accelerated Graphics Port (AGP)
The latest addition to most computer systems was the inclusion of the
accelerated graphics port (AGP), until the PCI Express interface
became available for video.
The AGP operates at the bus clock frequency of the microprocessor. It is
designed so that a transfer between the video card and the system
memory can progress at a maximum speed.
The AGP can transfer data at a maximum rate of 2G bytes per second.
This port probably will never be used for any devices other than the
video card, so we do not devote much space to its coverage.
Because PCI Express video cards use 8 lanes, data transfer occurs at a
rate of 4 GBps for the x16 PCI Express video card.

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