Part of the Hardware glossary:

In a computer, a polled interrupt is a specific type of I/O interrupt that notifies the part of the computer containing the I/O interface that a device is ready to be read or otherwise handled but does not indicate which device. The interrupt controller must poll (send a signal out to) each device to determine which one made the request.

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The alternative to a polled interrupt is a vectored interrupt , an interrupt signal that includes the identity of the device sending the interrupt signal.

This was last updated in September 2005
Contributor(s): Roy
Posted by: Margaret Rouse

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