Technical hardware description
Page 8
Description
3 Technical hardware description
3.1 General information
To slow down the time for comfortable testing of PC cards we developed the ISA-
Extender card. A master switch, on one side of the extender card, switches all ISA-
Bus signals and voltages. This is required to allow hotplugging of the tested ISA
cards, in other words, this method allows the unplugging and plugging of ISA cards
without rebooting the PC. All operating voltages are protected by easy exchangeable
fuses. The ISA-slot-connector can be configured with a DIP switch. With the DIP
switch you can select which type of signals will be passed through to the upper slot of
the ISA Extender. This feature will help you to find errors in cards that contain short
circuited data or address signals.
All operating voltages are available at the 9-pin D-Sub connector. The connector
allows the operation of external devices that need an additional power supply. All
standard ISA slot voltages are available at this connector.
To reset the ISA board under test condition, simply press the reset button on the ISA-
Extender board. This activates the ISA slot reset signal and resets the hardware on
your ISA card. Secondly, the reset signal is generated by turning the PC off and on.
The extender consists of 2 boards: The extender card and a small exchangeable and
separately deliverable board, which sole purpose is to contain the ISA slot and the
connector to the ISA-Extender. Because of the limited lifetime of the upper ISA slot
the replacement of this spare part is cheaper than to exchange the hole ISA-
Extender. This is an important feature in mass production and testing.
3.2 Other Products
A comparable card is available for an PCI-Bus. It supports the same functions. If you
would like to have product information about this card, please contact us.
