Deck 5: Computer Systems Organization

Question 1

The Memory Data Register contains the address of the cell being fetched or stored. _________________________

Answer 1

False
data value
data values
data

Question 2

The sectors of a disk are placed in concentric circles called cells. _________________________

Answer 2

False
tracks
track

Question 3

The three parts of the ALU together are known as the ____________________.

Answer 3

data path

Question 4

Examples of volatile storage are mass storage devices such as disks and tapes. _________________________

Question 5

Memory locations are stored in row major order.

Question 6

In a direct access storage device, every unit of information has a unique ____________________.

Question 7

As computers become faster, memory access speeds are keeping pace.

Question 8

MIMD parallelism is a scalable architecture. _________________________

Question 9

Machines that use the simplified approach to designing instruction sets are known as ____________________ machines.

Question 10

Computer manufacturers use a standard cell size of eight ____________________.

Question 11

Registers can be accessed much more quickly than random access memory.

Question 12

The principle of locality states that when the computer uses something, it will probably use it again very soon.

Question 13

The first computer to achieve a speed of 1 million floating-point operations per second, 1 ____________________, was the Control Data 6600 in the mid-1960s.

Question 14

The instructions that can be decoded and executed by the control unit of a computer are represented in machine language.

Question 15

The set of all operations that can be executed by a processor is called its I/O set.

Question 16

In a two-level memory hierarchy, when the computer needs a piece of information, it looks in RAM first, then cache memory.

Question 17

The Von Neumann bottleneck is the inability of the sequential one-instruction-at-a-time computer Von Neumann model to handle today's large-scale problems.

Question 18

The normal mode of operation of a Von Neumann machine is sequential. _________________________

Question 19

Both RAM and ROM are memory chips into which information has been prerecorded during manufacture.

Question 20

The branch of computer science that studies computers in terms of their major functional units and how they work is known as computer organization.

Question 21

A(n) ____ handles the details of input/output and compensates for any speed differences between I/O devices and other parts of the computer.

A) cache
B) I/O register
C) decoder circuit
D) I/O controller

Question 22

The ____ holds the address of the next instruction to be executed.

A) status register
B) program counter
C) condition register
D) instruction register

Question 23

The acronym ____ is frequently used to refer to the memory unit of a computer.

A) ROM
B) CD
C) MDR
D) RAM

Question 24

The ____ machine language instructions alter the normal sequential flow of control.

A) data transfer
B) arithmetic
C) branch
D) compare

Question 25

To understand how computers process information, we must study computers as collections of ____ that perform tasks such as information processing, information storage, computation, and data transfer functional units.

A) data types
B) functional units
C) hardware
D) memory units

Question 26

A cache is typically ____ times faster than RAM but much smaller.

A) 5 to 10
B) 15 to 20
C) 20 to 30
D) 25 to 30

Question 27

To solve the difficulty of scaling memory organization, memories are physically organized into a ____-dimensional organization.

A) one
B) two
C) three
D) multi

Question 28

During the ____ phase, the control unit circuitry generates the necessary sequence of control signals and data transfer signals to the other units of the computer to carry out the instruction.

A) fetch
B) execution
C) store
D) decode

Question 29

The ____ are the devices that allow a computer system to communicate and interact with the outside world as well as store information.

A) registers
B) arithmetic/logic units
C) control units
D) input/output units

Question 30

To alert the computer that an input/output operation is done, a(n) ____ is transmitted to the processor.

A) condition code
B) interrupt signal
C) broadcast
D) execution instruction

Question 31

In the SIMD parallel processing model, the control unit ____ instructions to every ALU.

A) broadcasts
B) decodes
C) stores
D) encodes

Question 32

In a ____, the original contents of the memory cell are unchanged.

A) nondestructive fetch
B) destructive store
C) random access memory
D) volatile storage

Question 33

The ____ of a disk is the time for the beginning of the desired sector to rotate under the read/write head.

A) latency
B) transfer time
C) frequency
D) seek time

Question 34

The ____ operation in Von Neumann machines uses a special set of bits known as condition codes.

A) compare
B) addition
C) control
D) looping

Question 35

If a computer has a maximum of 2ᴺ memory cells, then each address field in a machine language instruction must be ____ bits wide to enable us to address every cell.

A) N
B) 2N
C) N2
D) 2N

Question 36

____ machines are designed to directly provide a wide range of powerful features so that finished programs for these processors are shorter.

A) MISC
B) SICC
C) SISC
D) CISC

Question 37

There are ____ bytes in a gigabyte.

A) 210
B) 220
C) 230
D) 2100

Question 38

The ____ of a disk is the time needed to position the read/write head over the correct track.

A) latency
B) frequency
C) transfer speed
D) seek time

Question 39

A(n) ____ is a storage cell that holds the operands of an arithmetic operation and that, when the operation is complete, holds its result.

A) decoder
B) register
C) I/O controller
D) cache

Question 40

It is the task of the ____ to fetch and execute instructions.

A) arithmetic/logic unit (ALU)
B) I/O controllers
C) memory
D) control unit

Question 41

Draw an analogy between cache memory and a home refrigerator.

Question 42

What is the most fundamental characteristic of the Von Neumann architecture?

Question 43

Explain what a register is and how it differs from random access memory cells.

Question 44

Other than clock speed, what is an accurate measure of machine speed?

Question 45

What are the four major subsystems of the Von Neumann architecture?

Question 46

What is cluster computing?

Question 47

When a computer needs a piece of information, does it immediately perform the memory fetch operation? If not, what does it do?

Question 48

What is random access memory, and what are its three characteristics?

Question 49

Describe at length what quantum computing is.

Question 50

Explain at length what scalability means.