Hello.
I'm Brian Farrell.
And welcome to Peace City session on laptop expansion options.
Today, we're going to be talking about expansion cards, then we'll move on to random access memory
and we'll conclude with flash memory.
Now there's a fair amount of ground to cover.
So let's go ahead and begin the session, and we'll begin by talking about expansion cards for the laptop.
The laptops, small form factor and sometimes its method of manufacturing can make it functionally more
difficult to expand if increasing the functionality of a laptop is the goal.
In some cases, a technician doesn't have the option of just opening the case and inserting new hardware.
However, in many cases, the increased capabilities can be achieved through other means.
That's where expansion cards can come into play.
The first expansion cards developed for laptops were the PCM CIA card.
They were introduced by the Personal Computer Memory Card Industry Association in 1990.
They were also known as the PC card and later as the card bus.
Originally, it was developed as a means of expanding the storage capabilities, a very small form factor
devices.
And then it was extended to work with laptops.
After its initial development, additional capabilities were added to the standards.
Now, the PCM CIA card either uses a 16 bit or 32 bit data path, and it came in three types.
The first card developed was the Type one card.
It's three point three millimeters thick, and it only came with the 16 bit data path.
It was commonly used as additional random access memory or as flash memory or as static random access
memory.
Then along came the type two card.
It was five millimeters thick, and it could come with either a 16 or 32 bit data path.
It introduced input output support to the card.
Commonly, they were used as modems or network interface cards.
The final type of PC and CIA card was the type three card.
It was ten point five millimeters thick, and it always came with a 32 bit data path.
This is the card bus card.
It is more robust and allows for a full sized interface, as opposed to the compact input output interfaces
that came with the type two card.
External hard drives were also developed as type three card bus cards.
As the PC card or card bus card age, we discovered that it didn't work as well as we'd hoped.
So the PCM CIA developed the express card and introduced it in 2003 as the replacement for the card
bus.
It has all the features and functionality of the earlier cards, but also offers additional performance.
And what do I mean by that?
Well, it can take advantage of internal connections to either the PCI or U.S. B bus.
This allows for possible transfer rates of two hundred and eighty megabits per second and USB two mode
and up to three point two gigabits per second in either USB three mode or in PCI e two mode.
Now, the PCM CIA disbanded in 2009.
That means that this standard is no longer being developed.
However, the standard is being maintained by the USB Implementers Forum, the U.S. B Dash I f now express
cards came in two formats the ExpressCard 34 and the Express Card 54.
The ExpressCard 34 is 34 mm wide and 75 mm long with a twenty six pin connector.
The Express Card, 54, is 54 mm wide and 75 mm long, and it also had a twenty six pin connector and
it's easily recognizable because its L-shaped.
Now the Express Card 54 slot could accept either of the express card formats.
So if your laptop came with an Express Card 54 slot, you could use either card in that laptop.
Now, let's move on to random access memory.
Laptops use the small outline dual in-line memory module.
The sodium.
It was developed as the random access memory solution for the smaller form factor.
In many cases, it isn't easily performed expansion option used to increase the performance of a laptop.
Sodium came in many different versions.
There was the 100 pin SD RAM, the one hundred and forty four pin SD RAM, the 200 pin DDR, the 200
pin DDR two, the two hundred and four pin DDR three, and the two hundred and sixty pin DDR for increasing
the amount of sodium in a laptop can increase performance just as increasing the amount of RAM in a
PC does in modern laptops.
It's not uncommon for their sodium to be soldered in place.
In these cases, you cannot easily upgrade the RAM.
Now let's talk about flash memory.
So what is flash memory?
Well, it's a type of non-volatile computer memory that was developed by Toshiba.
Non-Volatile means that it doesn't require an electrical charge to maintain the state of the data.
It's commonly used as a highly portable method of storing data in applications.
Its most common form factor is the USB flash drive.
It is reasonably inexpensive and it can operate at high speeds.
Now, some operating systems can use flash memory as random access memory.
Specifically, Microsoft developed ready boost as a means of caching data on flash, effectively extending
the random access memory to the flash memory module.
That often leads to an increase in the performance of a laptop due to the nature of its construction
and operation.
Flash memory performance does degrade over time, and it will eventually wear out.
But don't worry.
In most cases, you lose it before you wear it out.
Now that concludes this session on laptop expansion options.
We started with expansion card options for the laptop.
Then we moved on to random access memory and we concluded with flash memory.
Now, on behalf of Peace I.T. Thank you for watching this session, and I'm looking forward to doing
another one.