Expansion slots are located on the motherboard, and openings on the back of the computer allow the ports on the cards that go in the slots to be accessed.There are several types of expansion slots, including AGP, PCIe (also known as PCIexpress), PCI, and ISA.
ISA Slots: ISA slots are an older type of expansion slot, twice as big as PCI slots and slower than PCI slots as well. ISA slots are usually black, while PCI slots are usually white. ISA slots are not used much anymore, but most computers still have at least one of them.
PCI Slots: PCI slots can handle 64 bits of data at a time, twice as fast as ISA slots, which can only handle 32 bits of data at a time. PCI is an abbreviation for "Peripheral Component Interconnect." A 64-bit PCI slot has 64 connections to the motherboard, and each connection is capable of handling 1 bit of data at a time. A 32-bit ISA slot has 32 connections to the motherboard, each handling one bit of data at a time.
As technology changes, new expansion cards become available. These include video cards, which allow a monitor to be connected to the computer, sound cards, which allow speakers and a microphone to be connected to the computer, and networking cards, which allow computers to be linked together. There are many types of expansion cards.
A sound card is what processes sound and allows speakers and a microphone to be hooked up to the computer. When you hear music coming from your computer's speakers, the sound card's digital signal processor, also known as the DSP, is working together with the digital-to-analog converter, also known as the DAC, processing and converting digital sound data (electrical pulses represented by binary code) to analog sound data (increases and decreases in electrical pulses that the speaker interprets and generates as increases and decreases in tone, frequency, and volume.) When you talk into your computer's microphone, the sound card's digital signal processor works along with the analog-to-digital converter to process and convert analog sound data to digital sound data, which can be saved onto your computers memory
SCSI (pronounced "scuzzy") is an abbreviation for "Small Computer Interface System." With a SCSI expansion card, you can connect up to fifteen devices to one SCSI connection. SCSI is one of the fastest data transfer interfaces there is. SCSI cards are available with transfer rates up to 320 MB per second! The Ultra320 SCSI-3 interface is the fastest SCSI interface, with a 320MB/sec data transfer rate
AGP Slots: The AGP expansion slot connects AGP video cards to the motherboard. Video cards are also known as graphics cards. They process video and image data that will be displayed on your screen. The monitor plugs into the video card. AGP is an abbreviation for Accelerated Graphics Port. Most AGP video cards are capable of a higher data transfer rate than PCI video cards.
AGP slots and cards come in four different modes, and you must be careful to match the card and slot with the correct mode. Some AGP cards and AGP slots are capable of running in more than one mode. AGP 1x mode is the oldest; it transfers data at 266MBs per second. AGP 2x mode transfers data at 533megabytes per second. AGP 4x mode transfers data at 1.07 gigabytes (1007 megabytes) per second. The latest AGP mode is AGP 8x. It transfers data at 2.14gigabytes (2140 megabytes) per second.
PCI EXPRESS: PCI Express is a new technology that is slowly replacing AGP. PCI Express x16 slots can transfer data at 4GBs per second, which is about twice as fast as an AGP 8x slot. PCIe stands for PCI Express, or PCIexpress. PCI Express slots come in five different sizes and speeds: PCIe x1, PCIe x2, PCIe x4, PCIe x8, and PCIe x16. PCIe x16 slots are used for graphics cards
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