What is an octal bus transceiver

[Nora]

Can someone please explain to me what an octal bus transceiver chip is used for?
I have read some stuff on different data sheets but don't really understand what it is.
Thanks!
NN

 

[btbass]

It is used to buffer and drive the data lines in a high speed microprocessor system. It is a transceiver so it can provide two way communication.
The higher the speed, the more power is required to provide the switching currents.
These days, for most embedded systems, modern Microprocessors have enough onboard memory, so interfacing to external memory is not required.
They are now mostly used for digital interfaces between systems that need to drive long backplanes and such like.