Specifications

EISA Configuration Utility
Chapter 5
EISA Configuration Utility
The EISA Configuration Utility software utility from American Mega-
trends, Inc. configures EISA (Extended Industry Standard Architecture)
computer systems.
EISA systems and adapter cards are much more complex and flexible than
the older ISA designs. The EISA configuration Utility was created to auto-
mate this configuration process in EISA systems.
The ECU permits the user to configure an EISA computer. The ECU takes
into account the needs of all adapter cards in the system. The ECU config-
ures the EISA devices and sets and maintains system parameters, storing
them in EISA CMOS RAM. The ECU guarantees that there will be no
conflicts or contention issues between adapter cards, since it assigns all
necessary system resources.
The ECU must be executed every time ISA or EISA adapter cards are
physically added, removed, or moved. The ECU operates on the information
provided by the CFG (configuration) files that accompany the EISA moth-
erboard and EISA or ISA adapter cards.
5.1 EISA Specification
EISA is an acronym for Extended Industry Standard Architecture. EISA is
basically a superset of the Industry Standard Architecture (ISA), which is
based on IBM's original PC/AT specifications. The EISA specifications
allow 32-bit memory addressing to be used by the CPU, DMA devices, and
bus mastering devices. The above devices can also use either 16-bit or 32-bit
data transferring.
5.1.1 EISA/ISA Differences
An important different between ISA and EISA is that in EISA systems,
configuration is done through software, rather than the hardware switches
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