PC Card

In computing, PC Card is a form factor peripheral interface designed for laptop computers, superseded by CardBus in 1995 and then ExpressCard in 2003. Originally known as PCMCIA Card, short for Personal Computer Memory Card International Association, the PC Card standard as well as its successors were defined and developed by the Personal Computer Memory Card International Association (PCMCIA), which itself was created by a number of computer industry companies in 1986 by Jacob D. Holm. It was originally designed as a standard for memory-expansion cards to compete with the JEIDA memory card standard developed in Japan. In 1991 the two standards merged as JEIDA 4.1 or PCMCIA 2.0 (PC Card).

PC Card was originally designed for computer storage expansion, but the existence of a usable general standard for notebook peripherals led to many kinds of devices being made available based on the form factor, including network cards, modems, and hard disks. The cards were also used in early digital SLR cameras, such as the Kodak DCS 300 series. However, their original use as storage expansion is no longer common.

Many notebooks in the 1990s had two adjacent type-II slots, which allowed installation of two type-II cards or one, double-thickness, type-III card. The PC card port has been superseded by the ExpressCard interface, though some manufacturers such as Dell continued to offer them into 2012 on their ruggedized XFR notebooks .

Famous quotes containing the word card:

“There is undoubtedly something religious about it: everyone believes that they are special, that they are chosen, that they have a special relation with fate. Here is the test: you turn over card after card to see in which way that is true. If you can defy the odds, you may be saved. And when you are cleaned out, the last penny gone, you are enlightened at last, free perhaps, exhilarated like an ascetic by the falling away of the material world.”
—Andrei Codrescu (b. 1947)