Network interface controller - Wikipedia
Network interface controller
A network interface controller (NIC, also known as a network interface card,1 network adapter, LAN adapter and physical network interface2) is a computer hardware component that connects a computer to a computer network.3
Early network interface controllers were commonly implemented on expansion cards that plugged into a computer bus. The low cost and ubiquity of the Ethernet standard means that most newer computers have a network interface controller built into the motherboard or contained in a USB -connected dongle, although network cards remain available.
Modern network interface controllers offer advanced features such as interrupt and DMA interfaces to the host processors, support for multiple receive and transmit queues, partitioning into multiple logical interfaces, and on-controller network traffic processing such as the TCP offload engine.
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Footnotes
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“Enhancing Scalability Through Network Interface Card Partitioning” (PDF). Dell. April 2011. Retrieved May 12, 2014. ↩
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“Physical Network Interface”. Microsoft. January 7, 2009. ↩
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Posey, Brien M. (2006). “Networking Basics: Part 1 - Networking Hardware”. Windowsnetworking.com. TechGenix Ltd. Retrieved 2012-06-09. ↩