Computers 1 min read

System Resource

Published September 3, 2003 12:00 am

A tool used by either hardware to alert software of a need or by software to control a function of hardware. Hardware and software need a way to communicate with each other, and they do so by using a combination of four system resources:

IRQ Hardware devices use the IRQ bus on a motherboard to signal the CPU for attention.
port addresses Software addresses a hardware device using the device s port, or I/O, address. The device “listens” to the bus to determine if it is being requested.
memory addresses Software communicates with physical memory located in either RAM or ROM chips using memory addresses.
DMA channel Data travels back and forth between memory and a hardware device using this channel.

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