3Com 10/100BASE-T4 User Manual

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LOSSARY

MAC

Media access control. The operational scheme that gives
each network node orderly access to the network cable.
CSMA/CD is a MAC protocol that determines how nodes on
the network share access to the cable.

NDIS

Network Driver Interface Specification. Defines the LAN Manager
network driver architecture and interfaces that let a DOS or OS/2
system support network adapters. This architecture provides a
standardized way to write drivers for network adapters.

NetWare

A series of network operating systems and related products
made by Novell, Inc.

ODI driver

Open Data-Link Interface. A MAC-level specification
developed by Novell and Apple

. Drivers complying with this

specification can work with NetWare 2.x, 3.x, and 4.x. Like NDIS,
ODI drivers support multiple protocols and adapters, and can
be unloaded from memory to conserve conventional DOS
RAM space.

Parallel Tasking

3Com’s third-generation Ethernet adapter architecture.
Parallel Tasking technology accelerates data transfer by
processing data packets simultaneously instead of
sequentially. For example, when transmission is the task, the
Parallel Tasking architecture begins to write data to the
network even before an entire frame has been loaded into
the adapter’s buffer memory. This permits complete
parallelism in all data transfers.

PCI

Peripheral Component Interconnect. An advanced high-
performance local bus that supports multiple peripheral
devices. At 33 MHz, the PCI bus transfers 32 bits of data at up
to 132 Mbps.