AOpen AP5VM, Руководство пользователя

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Frequently Asked Questions
B-3
A: MMX is the new single-line multiple-instruction technology of the new Intel
Pentium PP/MT (P55C) and Pentium II (Klamath) CPU. The AMD K6 and
Cyrix M2 will support MMX too. The MMX instructions are specifically useful
for multimedia applications (such as 3D video, 3D sound, video conference).
The performance can be improved if applications use these instructions. All
AOpen MBs have at least dual power onboard to support MMX. It is not
necessary to have special chipset for MMX CPU.
Q: What is USB (Universal Serial Bus)?
A: USB is a new 4-pin serial peripheral bus that is capable of cascading
low/medium speed peripherals (less than 10Mbit/s) such as keyboard,
mouse, joystick, scanner, printer and modem/ISDN. With USB, the
traditional complex cables from back panel of your PC can be eliminated.
You need the USB driver to support USB device(s). AOpen MBs are all USB
ready, you may get latest BIOS from AOpen web site
(http://www.aopen.com.tw). Our latest BIOS includes the keyboard driver
(called Legacy mode), that simulates USB keyboard to act as AT or PS/2
keyboard and makes it possible to use USB keyboard if you don't have driver
in your OS. For other USB devices, you may get the drivers from your
device vendor or from OS (such as Win95). Be sure to turn off " USB
Legacy Support" in BIOS "Chipset Setup" if you have another driver in your
OS.
Q: What is P1394?
A: P1394 (IEEE 1394) is another standard of high-speed serial peripheral bus.
Unlike low or medium speed USB, P1394 supports 50 to 1000Mbit/s and can
be used for video camera, disk and LAN. Since P1394 is still under
development, , there is no P1394 device currently available in the PC
market. Also, there is no chipset that can support P1394. Probably in the
near future, a card will be developed to support P1394 device.
Q: What is SMBus (System Management Bus, also called I2C bus)?
A: SMBus is a two-wire bus developed for component communicati on
(especially for semiconductor IC). It is most useful for notebook to detect
component status and replace hardware configuration pin (pull-high or pull-
low). For example, disabling clock of DIMM that does not exist, or detecting
battery low condition. The data transfer rate of SMBus is only 100Kbit/s, it
allows one host to communicate with CPU and many masters and slaves to
send/receive message. The SMBus may be used for jumpless mainboard,
the components which support SMbus are not ready yet, we will keep eyes
on it.