Card Setup
Omega Engineering
OMG-P232/P422
Page
3
Card Setup
Card and Socket Services must be loaded on the system prior to installing
the
OMG-P232/P422
card. Card and Socket Services are typically
supplied by the PCMCIA slot provider (i.e. the computer manufacturer or
the PC adapter manufacturer).
Socket Services are the lowest level of the PCMCIA Software hierarchy.
Socket Services provide a standard interface to the higher level drivers
and isolate the socket controller’s specific hardware details. Socket
Services provide the
‘
BIOS
’
interface to the socket controller hardware.
Socket Services are typically hidden under Card Services and are rarely
directly accessible by application software.
Card Services provide the interface to application software and drivers.
Card Services are responsible for allocating card resources and ensuring
that card resources do not interfere with other existing system resources.
Card Services are typically implemented as a driver and loaded via
CONFIG.SYS during boot up. Almost all PCMCIA type cards require
some sort of software driver. In the case of the
OMG-P232/P422
, the
generic Card Services driver supplied with the computer system should
provide adequate support for most applications. If the generic Card
Services are not sufficient, an
‘
Enabler
’
is provided with the
OMG-
P232/P422
that will address unique interfacing requirements (i.e. non
standard I/O addressing, different IRQ selection etc.). Please refer to
Appendix C for information on the SEAPC enabler and the diagnostic
tool SSEnable.
The following pages present a few examples of main stream Card and
Socket Services and their implementation (including Windows 95).