BS61M
series
~29~
2.3-5 Installing the interface card
This section explains how to install new interface cards onto your
motherboard. It covers the installation of ISA cards and PCI cards. Your
motherboard comes with seven interface cards expansion slots: three PCI
slots and two ISA slots. When you purchase an expansion card, it will come
with installation instructions, so the information below pertains to the
installation of cards as they relate to the motherboard.
PCI Cards and Slots
Nearly any PCI card you buy these days will be plug-and-play (PnP)
installable. If you are using an operating system that supports PnP, such as
Windows 95/98, your operating system should automatically detect the new
device and configure its settings, though you may still need to install the
appropriate drivers or software.
The PCI slots on your motherboard also have “Bus Master” capabilities.
For installed PCI cards to use this feature, an operating system-specific Bus
Master software driver that comes with this motherboard must be installed on
your system. These drivers are on the support disk.
ISA Cards and Slots
ISA expansion cards often use system resources in the form of IRQs and
DMA channels, although newer, PnP cards are designed to allow the
operating system to automatically configure system resources. Cards that
don’ t support PnP may require that both the CMOS settings and the settings
within the operating system be set manually.
If you have a PnP card, installation should be quite easy as most, if not all,
necessary adjustments will be made for you. If, however, you have a card that
doesn’ t support PnP, you may need to set resource settings manually in the
CMOS setup.