Users Guide

Glossary 145
power supply
An electrical system that converts AC current from the
wall outlet into the DC currents required by the system
circuitry. The power supply in a personal computer
typically generates multiple voltages.
power unit
A set of power supplies in a system chassis.
ppm
Abbreviation for pages per minute.
PPP
Abbreviation for Point-to-Point Protocol.
PQFP
Abbreviation for plastic quad flat pack, a type of
microprocessor socket in which the microprocessor
chip is permanently mounted.
program diskette set
The set of diskettes from which you can perform a
complete installation of an operating system or
application program. When you reconfigure a program,
you often need its program diskette set.
protected mode
An operating mode supported by 80286 or higher
microprocessors, protected mode allows operating
systems to implement:
• A memory address space of 16 MB (80286
microprocessor) to 4 GB (Intel386 or higher
microprocessor)
• Multitasking
• Virtual memory, a method for increasing addressable
memory by using the hard drive
The Windows NT, OS/2
®
, and UNIX
®
32-bit
operating systems run in protected mode. MS-DOS
cannot run in protected mode; however, some
programs that you can start from MS-DOS, such as the
Windows operating system, are able to put the system
into protected mode.
provider
A provider is an extension of a CIM schema that
communicates with managed objects and accesses data
and event notifications from a variety of sources.
Providers forward this information to the CIM Object
Manager for integration and interpretation.
PS
Abbreviation for power supply.
PS/2
Abbreviation for Personal System/2.
PXE
Abbreviation for Pre-boot eXecution Environment.
QFP
Abbreviation for quad flat pack.
RAC
Acronym for remote access controller.
RAID
Acronym for redundant array of independent drives.
RAM
Acronym for random-access memory. A system's
primary temporary storage area for program
instructions and data. Each location in RAM is
identified by a number called a memory address. Any
information stored in RAM is lost when you turn off
your system.
RAMDAC
Acronym for random-access memory
digital-to-analog converter.
RAW
Unprocessed. The term refers to data that is passed
along to an I/O device without being interpreted. In
contrast, cooked refers to data that is processed before
being passed to the I/O device. It often refers to
uncompressed text that is not stored in any proprietary