Hardware interrupt
In the case of a hardware interrupt (from English hardware , device and English / Latin interrupt , interruption), an interrupt is triggered by a hardware component or a peripheral device .
A distinction is made between maskable (blockable) and non-maskable interrupts. If a device triggers a non-maskable interrupt (NMI for short), an active signal is fed to the processor's NMI connection. The processor processes the command that has just been executed and immediately afterwards executes an interrupt. An NMI is triggered on the PC if a hardware reset is to be carried out or if there is a serious hardware error, for example the "Parity Error". This is an error in the main memory, which can, however, also be triggered if the " Parity Boot " virus is infected .
In contrast, the interrupt requests ( IRQ ) can be masked. These interrupts are present at the INTR connection of the processor.
The interrupt controller plays an important role in handling hardware interrupts . It manages several interrupt requests and forwards them to the processor in order of priority .