When the computer boots up, certain amounts of information are needed to ensure that the computer boots properly. This includes hard disk types, keyboard and display type, chip set and the time and data. For example, the hard drive booting properly means that the operating system boots properly. This is important to understand because it explains why CMOS RAM is so important. CMOS (complementary metal-oxide semiconductor) RAM is a type of memory chip that has low power requirements. When in a PC, it operates by using a series of small Read More

An IBM ThinkPad laptop can have three hardware password sets: Power-On Password Hard Disk Password Supervisor Password Power-On Password RT/CMOS RAM has 8 bytes reserved for the power-on password and the check character. The 8 bytes are initialized to hex 00. The microprocessor can access these bytes only during POST. After POST is completed, if a power-on password is installed, the password bytes are locked and no program can access them. During power-on password installation, the password (1 to 7 characters) is stored in the security space. Installing the password Read More

FAIS (Fabric Application Interface Standard), is a project of the ANSI/INCITS T11.5 task group. The purpose of FAIS is to define a common Application Programming Interface (API) framework for implementing storage applications in a storage networking environment. FAIS was proposed in T11/03-305v2: Project Proposal For A New INCITS Standard Fabric Application Interface Standard (FAIS). A good overview of FAIS is A New Standard for Fabric Intelligence by Tom Clark. FAIS (Fabric Application Interface Standard) is presented here courtesy of The Enterprise Storage Management FAQ.

Many people install security features on their computer in order to prevent unauthorized users from accessing the computer when they are away. For example, login identification, file encryption, and even biometric identification are all sufficient methods of keeping intruders out of someone’s personal information. However, some users may wish to go even further by locking their keyboard in order to prevent unauthorized users from entering a password, children from playing with the keyboard, or pets from unknowingly typing when climbing on keys. There are several ways to lock a keyboard Read More

An incremental backup is a backup of every file on a file system which has changed since the last backup. The alternatives to an incremental backup are differential backup and full backup. An incremental backup is the fastest backup and requires the least storage space on the backup media. However, incremental backups also require the longest time and many tapes to restore. Incremental backups should be used only in environments where backup time or backup storage media are extremely constrained. For most environments, a weekly full backup and a daily Read More

An occupancy sensor is a device that is capable of detecting and/or recording the amount of people in a room or area. Occupancy sensors are most often used to determine how many people are in an area that may restrict the total occupancy or in a system that turns lights/other accessories off when no one is using them. Occupancy sensors are relatively simple and are usually just motion detectors that are used in conjunction with a timing device to record how long people have been away from an area. How Read More

A power converter is a power supply unit (PSU) that not only delivers energy to an electronic device from an electrical outlet, but also regulates the current to meet the devices specific requirements. If you have any type of sophisticated electronics such as computers, laptops, high end audio equipment, cell phones etc, the odds are they also incorporate a power supply unit that also regulates the current. Most power converters are usually called Switched Mode Power Supplies (SMPS); they include a power supply unit and a circuit inside the unit Read More

Speech recognition has various applications. It can be used in automated phone systems that allow the users to input choices and browse through menus without pressing any keys. Speech recognition systems are also used in businesses and homes to allow users to dictate to their computers and have their words transcribed into their word processing applications. They are currently being used for legal, medical or other transcription needs. Speech recognition also offers a method for giving computer commands. With voice instructions, users can command their computers to browse through folders, Read More

Celeron is an marketing name for Intel's lower-cost CPUs from the Pentium family. Intel has manufactured and sold Celeron versions of the Pentium II, Pentium III, Pentium 4, and Pentium-M CPUs. Intel purposefully limits the performance of their Celeron processors to prevent them from competing with their higher-end Pentium and Xeon processors. At the same time, the Intel Celeron processors are designed to compete against processors from AMD. The original Celeron design was a poor performer due to the lack of L2 cache. The next generation of the Celeron included Read More

64-bit hardware is no longer the next, big thing coming to the computer industry. Over the past several years, the 64-bit hardware environment has seen significant penetration in the personal computer and server market as engineering challenges have been worked through to alleviate concerns by consumers and industry in having to spend significant monies to invest in the 64 bit hardware environment. When the first 64 bit computers were introduced, the common complaint was that there was little to no performance benefit seen by the end-user while the processors were Read More