⊿ Point. {R} Glossary. ◢ Keyword: B. ▰ Sources. 〓 Books [B] ◥ University. {q} PhD. ⏫ THEMES. ⏫ Big Data. [B] Big Data. ⚫ USA. ↂ EndNote. ☝️ BD Dummies. Bus (computing) Four PCI Express bus card slots (from top to 2nd bottom: ×4, ×16, ×1 and ×16), compared to a 32-bit conventional PCI bus card slot (very bottom) It is possible to allow peripherals to communicate with memory in the same fashion, attaching adaptors in the form of expansion cards directly to the system bus.
This is commonly accomplished through some sort of standardized electrical connector, several of these forming the expansion bus or local bus. However, as the performance differences between the CPU and peripherals varies widely, some solution is generally needed to ensure that peripherals do not slow overall system performance.
Many CPUs feature a second set of pins similar to those for communicating with memory, but able to operate at very different speeds and using different protocols. As the number of potential peripherals grew, using an expansion card for every peripheral became increasingly untenable. An address bus is a bus that is used to specify a physical address.