The PC Doctor's Fix-it-Yourself Guide- P26: A technical director for a UK-based computer company who teaches such courses as Caring for Your PC has developed prescriptions for treating sick PCs. Arguing the benefits of fixing it yourself rather than relying on experts, his mission is to empower users with trouble- shooting and safe repair skills. | Chapter 12 Expansion Cards Copyright 2004 by The McGraw-Hill Companies. Click here for terms of use. 250 The PC Doctor s Fix-It-Yourself Guide Expansion cards offer a way to expand on the capabilities of your PC by adding more circuit boards to the system directly onto the motherboard using preexisting connections called slots . Every desktop PC and tower offers slots that allow you to add cards. In this chapter we ll examine the different slots that you might encounter inside a PC and look at several different kinds of expansion cards that you can add to your system. Expansion Slots There are three different kinds of expansion slots that you are likely to come across when you look at the motherboard of your PC. These are PCI Peripheral Component Interconnect AGP Accelerated Graphics Port and ISA Industry Standard Architecture . PCI Peripheral Component Interconnect Most of the cards you will have in your system will be PCI cards. Network cards modems TV cards and sound cards are all now usually in PCI form with many graphics cards being made to fit the PCI slot too. When you look at PCI cards that fit into the slots you may come across a wide variety of connector numbers. The 32-bit PCI cards that is those capable of transmitting 32 bits of information simultaneously have 124-pin connectors not just carrying data but also power supply for the card and grounding while 64-bit cards have 188-pin connectors. Figure 12-1 shows a close-up of a PCI slot on a motherboard and Figure 12-2 shows a typical PCI card. Card lengths can also vary. The PCI specifications define two different lengths The full-size PCI form factor is 312 mm long. Shorter PCI cards range from 119 mm to 167 mm in length to fit into smaller slots where space is an issue. Close-up of a PCI slot on a motherboard FIGURE 12-1 CHAPTER 12 Expansion Cards 251 A PCI card FIGURE 12-2 AGP Accelerated Graphics Port Because of the volume of data that graphics demand trying to push huge amounts of data through a .
