hardware appliance


hardware appliance

A device that is dedicated to a specific function in contrast to a general-purpose computer. The hardware comes pre-installed with its operating system and application. Many consider the router to be the first network appliance.

A "software appliance" is the software alone, which must be installed in the computer. Following is a list of common hardware appliances. See virtual appliance.
 caching appliance digital appliance email appliance firewall appliance Internet appliance Internet server appliance network appliance server appliance