Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
Main page; Contents; Current events; Random article; About Wikipedia; Contact us
In computing, booting is the process of starting a computer as initiated via hardware such as a physical button on the computer or by a software command. After it is switched on, a computer's central processing unit (CPU) has no software in its main memory , so some process must load software into memory before it can be executed.
The computer first executes a relatively small program stored in the boot ROM, which is read-only memory (ROM, and later EEPROM, NOR flash) along with some needed data, to initialize hardware devices such as CPU, motherboard, memory, storage and other I/O devices, to access the nonvolatile device (usually block device, e.g., NAND flash) or ...
In many cases programs may appear to be hung, but are making slow progress, and waiting a few minutes will allow the task to complete. Modern operating systems provide a mechanism for terminating hung processes, for instance, with the Unix kill command, or through a graphical means such as the Task Manager's "end task" button in Windows (select the particular process in the list and press "end ...
The original IBM PC could be equipped with as little as 16 KB of RAM and typically had between 64 and 640 KB; depending on the amount of equipped memory, the computer's 4.77 MHz 8088 required between 5 seconds and 1.5 minutes to complete the POST and there was no way to skip it.
Experts say that outdated tech could cause your computer to slow down. “If the device is 3-plus years old, there’s a chance that a hardware or software failure/deterioration may be causing ...
Hibernation (also known as suspend to disk, or Safe Sleep on Macintosh computers [1]) in computing is powering down a computer while retaining its state. When hibernation begins, the computer saves the contents of its random access memory (RAM) to a hard disk or other non-volatile storage. When the computer is turned on the RAM is restored and ...
To perform useful functions, processes need access to the peripherals connected to the computer, which are controlled by the kernel through device drivers. A device driver is a computer program encapsulating, monitoring and controlling a hardware device (via its Hardware/Software Interface (HSI)) on behalf of the OS. It provides the operating ...