QUALIFICATION: Bachelor of (Computer Science, Informatics & Cyber Security)

QUALIFICATION CODE: 07BACS,07BAIF,07BCCS LEVEL: 5

COURSE: Computer Organisation and Architecture COURSE CODE: COA511S
DATE: 12 April 2019 SESSION: THEORY
DURATION: 60 Min MARKS: 34

TEST-2 MEMO
EXAMINER(S): MR. JULIUS SILAA (Theory ALL, FT1 & FT6)
MS. ALBERTINA SHILONGO(FT2, FT9)
MS. JOVITA MATEUS (FT 3 & FT 10B)
MR. ELIEZER MBAEVA (4 )
MS. EUNICE MBASUVA( FT 8 & PT3 )
MR. VEERAB PADURI ( FT5 & FT 10)
MR. JEREMIAH LUMBASI ( PT 2)
MR.GABRIEL NHINDA ( PT1)
MS .IIPINGE , (FT 7)
MODERATOR: MR. SIMON MUCHINENYIKA
THIS MEMO CONSISTS OF 6 PAGES (INCLUDING THIS FRONT PAGE)

INSTRUCTIONS TO MODERATOR/SECOND EXAMINER

1. Please use the memorandum or sample solutions to guide your marking.
2. When marking questions, you should be guided by the allocation of marks.
3. Sample answers or solutions appear in bold.
4. Reasonable, in depth or innovative correct solutions provided by the students should be
allocated marks even though not provided in this memorandum

Page 1 of 6
SECTION A: Answer All Questions. Each Question weighs 1 Mark. [10 MARKS]
Circle the correct answer
1. The I/O function includes a control and timing requirement, to coordinate the flow of
traffic between internal resources and external devices. [True/False]
2. In a parallel interface, there is only one line used to transmit data, and bits must be
transmitted one at a time. [True/False]
3. In the Direct Memory Access (DMA) mode, the I/O module and main memory exchange
data directly, without processor involvement. [True/False]
4. Paging is usually visible to the programmer and is provided as a convenience for
organizing programs and data and as a means for associating privilege and protection
attributes with instructions and data. [True/False]
5. It is not possible to connect I/O controllers directly onto the system bus. [True/False]
6. The ______________exist in one of two states and , in the absence of input ,remains in
that state
A. assert B. complex PLD

C. Decoder D. Flip-flops

7. ________ are used in digital circuits to control signal and data routing.
A. Multiplexers B. Program counters
C. Flip-flops D. Gates

8. In any number, the leftmost digit is referred to as the _________.

A. least significant digit B. a most common digit
C. most significant digit D. least common digit

9. In floating-point arithmetic, when a positive exponent exceeds the maximum possible

exponent. It is known as __________.
A. Exponent underflow B. Exponent overflow
C. Significand underflow D. Significand overflow

10 ________ is implemented with combinational circuits.

A. Nano memory B. Random access memory

C. Read only memory D. No memory

SECTION B: Structured questions. Answer All Questions. [24 MARKS]

Page 2 of 6
Question 1 ( Removed)

Briefly Explain the following external memory concepts (6 marks)

i. RAID
ii. RAID mirroring
iii. RAID Striping

i. Redundant Array of Independent disks: is a data storage virtualization technology that

combines multiple physical disk drive components into a single logical unit for the purposes
of data redundancy, performance improvement, or both.

ii. Disk mirroring, also known as RAID 1, is the replication of data to two or more disks.
Disk mirroring is a good choice for applications that require high performance and high
availability, such as transactional applications, email and operating systems.

iii. In computer data storage, data striping is the technique of segmenting logically
sequential data, such as a file, so that consecutive segments are stored on different physical
storage devices. Striping is useful when a processing device requests data more quickly than
a single storage device can provide it
(Award 2 marks to each correct explanation, total 6 marks )

Question 2

CPU is a precious computer resource and a good computing system should be design in such
way to utilise CPU efficiently. Explain why interrupt driven is better than Programmed
I/O in terms of CPU usage? (3 marks)

With interrupt-driven I/O is relatively better CPU does not have to wait for an I/O
operation to complete

With programmed I/O When the processor issues a command to the I/O module, it must
wait until the I/O operation is complete

Note: In both programmed and interrupt I/O, the processor is involved either partially or
fully to extract data from main memory for output and storing data in main memory for
input

A good answer should therefore emphasize a need to free CPU time as much as possible
The precious processor should never get stuck at administering slow i/o devices but
should spend most of its time supervising the most important processes

Award full mark for each correct explanation given or 2 if just partially
attempted otherwise zero .

Page 3 of 6
Question 3

a) Explain your understanding of the following virtual memory concepts (3 marks)

i) paging
ii) demand paging

b) What is an ultimate importance of virtual memory management scheme?(2 marks)

a) i)In computer operating systems, paging is a memory management scheme by

which a computer stores and retrieves data from secondary storage in same size
blocks called pages for use in main memory secondary storage in same-size
b ) In virtual memory systems, demand paging is a type of swapping in which pages
of data are not copied from disk to RAM until they are needed

c) It allows us to run more applications on the system than we have enough

physical memory to support. It's used by operating systems to simulate
physical RAM by using hard disk space

award full marks to any convincing response based on the

Question 4

Convert the following numbers.

Write your answers in the spaces provided below the number and show your work:
No calculator is permitted
Award zero for any answer where no calculation method shown
.
i) 257 to binary= 1000 00001 i.e 256 +1 (2 marks)

ii. )C216 to binary= 1100 0010 (2 marks)

2=0 0 1 0 AND C = 12; 12 in binary = 1 1 0 0

2 8 + 4 = 12

Combine the 2 binary parts = 1100 0010

iii.) 3D16 to decimal = ??? (2 marks)

0 0 1 1 1 1 0 1

32 +16+ 8+4 + 1= 61

OR 3D 16 = (316 * 161) + (D16 * 160)

Page 4 of 6
 = (310 * 161) + (1310 * 160) = 61

Question 5

a) Give any two examples of each of the following types of Digital circuits (4 marks)
i) Combinational
adder, multiplexer, decoder, encode & ROM
ii) Sequential
Flip flops(Latches), counter, shift registers and PLA

b) An adder is a digital circuit that perform addition of numbers . In many computers and
other kinds of processors adders are used in arithmetic logic units

i) List any two important logical gates found in an Adder (2 marks)

AND gate, & Exclusive OR gate

(Award 1 marks to each correct response)

ii) Draw a half adder circuit based on the two logical gates. Your half Adder should be able to

take any two inputs in order to produce the output (3 marks)

Each correct gate notation used = 0.5

inpu A & B combined = 0.5
Correct output ( cary and sum) = 1
General correctness especially interconnections=0.5

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iii) Demonstrate your input and output operation by means of a truth table (2 marks)

1 mark for a correct set of input

0.5 mark each for a correct Sum and Carry output

*****END OF TEST2 MEMO*****

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