e System Unit of a Computer System

Multiple Choice Questions

1. Which of the following are components inside a 4. Which of the following statements about the
system unit of a computer? execution of a program instruction is incorrect?
(1) Power supply A. Addition of the values in two registers may
(2) Motherboard set zero flag to 1.

(3) Scanner B. Subtraction of the values in two registers

may set carry flag to 1.
A. (1) and (2) only
C. Every program instruction must be loaded
B. (1) and (3) only into the CPU via an address bus.
C. (2) and (3) only D. Every program instruction must be loaded
A into IR before execution.
D. (1), (2) and (3)
C

2. A DVD drive is a/an .

5. How many bytes of data can be transferred each
A. storage peripheral
time in a 32-bit computer system?
B. input peripheral
A. 1 byte
C. output peripheral
B. 2 bytes
A
D. communication peripheral
C. 3 bytes
D
3. Assume that the following instruction has been D. 4 bytes
loaded into the instruction register (IR).
6. Which of the following statements about system
ADD AX, 1
buses in a 32-bit computer system are correct?
Which registers must be accessed by the CPU
(1) The bus width of a data bus is 32 bits.
during the whole process of executing the
instruction? (2) The bus width of an address bus is 32
bits.
(1) Memory data register
(3) The bus width of a control bus is 32 bits.
(2) Program counter
(4) The size of one word is 32 bits.
(3) Accumulator
A. (1), (2) and (3) only
A. (1) and (2) only
B. (1), (2) and (4) only
B. (1) and (3) only
C. (2), (3) and (4) only
C. (2) and (3) only
D
B D. (1), (2), (3) and (4)
D. (1), (2) and (3)

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7. Which sub-cycle does the fetch of operand D. 5,000 C

TEMP involve during executing the following
instruction?
11. What information is stored in a read-only
LOAD AX, TEMP memory inside a desktop computer?
A. Fetch (1) Operating system
B. Decode (2) BIOS
C. Execute (3) Bootstrap program
C
D. Interrupt A. (1) and (2) only
B. (1) and (3) only
8. When an interrupt has occurred, the CPU saves
the current information of registers in C. (2) and (3) only
. C
D. (1), (2) and (3)
A. a stack
12. Which of the following shows the correct order
B. the main memory
of searching data from the different levels of
C. the cache memory during executing an instruction by a
D. a hard disk A CPU?
(1) Cache memory
9. Which of the following are the advantages of a (2) Register
computer with a longer word length?
(3) Main memory
(1) More information can be included in
the instruction set. (4) Hard disk

(2) More complicated instructions can be A. (3) ➔ (1) ➔ (2) ➔ (4)

included in the instruction set. B. (4) ➔ (3) ➔ (1) ➔ (2)
(3) The time for executing each instruction C. (1) ➔ (2) ➔ (3) ➔ (4)
is shorter.
D. (2) ➔ (1) ➔ (3) ➔ (4) D

A. (1) and (2) only

B. (1) and (3) only 13. Which of the following are technologies used in
a parallel processing CPU?
C. (2) and (3) only
A
(1) Pipelining
D. (1), (2) and (3)
(2) Multiple cores
10. A digital image takes up 512 KB of main (3) Multiple levels of cache
memory. How many images of this size can be
A. (1) and (2) only
stored in 1 GB of main memory?
B. (1) and (3) only
A. 200
C. (2) and (3) only
B. 500
D
D. (1), (2) and (3)
C. 2,000

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14. Which of the following is not an advantage of

developing multi-core CPUs over CPUs with
higher clock rates?
A. Smaller in the physical size of a CPU
B. Lower development cost
C. Higher potential for making faster CPUs by
scaling up the existing design
D. Less heat generation for each core
A

Short Questions

1. Ellen has a notebook computer which is equipped with two USB ports. One of the USB ports is connecting
to a mouse.

(a) For each of the following categories, suggest one peripheral which can be connected to the second
USB port of Ellen’s computer. (4 marks)

(i) Storage device Extenal hard disk / USB flash drive (any one × 1)

(ii) Communication device Wireless access point (1)

(iii) Input device Keyboard / scanner (any one × 1)

(iv) Output device Printer (1)

(b) Ellen wants to connect three or even more USB devices at the same time. She plugs a 4-port USB hub
to her notebook computer. State two potential problems that may occur in this setting. (2 marks)
• The USB devices work slower. (1)

• USB devices may fail to work due to low power supply. (1)

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2. (a) Complete the following diagram which illustrates the role of a CPU. (2 marks)

Output device (1)

Secondary
CPU storage device (1)

Data flow
Input device

(b) An instruction ‘ADD 1 to register BX’ is resident in the main memory. Describe the process of
how the instruction is loaded and executed by a CPU. (3 marks)
1. The control unit of a CPU fetches the instruction from the main memory and interprets the instruction. (1)

2. The control unit instructs the ALU how the instruction is performed. (1)

3. The ALU performs the arithmetic operation and sends the result to register BX. (1)

3. All registers in CPU X are 8-bit in length. Write the value of zero flag, sign flag and carry flag in the status
register (SR) when the following sequence of instructions is executed by CPU X. (3 marks)

Step Instruction Description

1 LOAD AX, 1 Load register AX with the value 1.
2 LOAD BX, 2 Load register BX with the value 2.
3 SUB AX, BX Subtract the value in BX from that in AX by and then store the result in AX.
4 ADD BX, 254 Add 254 to the value stored in BX and then store the result in BX.

The result of step 1 has been done as an example.

Step 1: ZF = 0, SF = 0, CF = 0
Step 2: ZF = 0, SF = 0, CF = 0 (1)

Step 3: ZF = 0, SF = 1, CF = 0 (1)

Step 4: ZF = 0, SF = 0, CF = 1 (1)

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Remark: The result of step 4 is 256 which is represented as 0000 0000 in BX. Carry flag and zero flag are set to 1 and 0 (for unsigned integer)

respectively. The sign flag is 0 for leftmost bit being 0.

4. (a) State two components of a CPU. (2 marks)

The control unit (CU) (1) and the arithmetic and logic unit (ALU) (1)

(b) State two factors that determine the performance of a CPU. (2 marks)
Clock rate (1) and word length (1)

(c) If you were a computer engineer, how would you change the two factors stated in part (b) so as to make
a CPU run faster? (2 marks)
• Increase the clock rate. (1)

• Increase the word length. (1)

5. (a) State one common characteristic between complementary metal oxide semiconductor (CMOS) memory
and read-only memory (ROM). (1 mark)
Both memory chips can store data when the power supply is switched off. (1)

(b) CMOS is usually used to hold information of a computer system such as the memory capacity and the
specification of a hard disk. Is it possible to use a ROM chip to replace a CMOS chip in a desktop
computer? Explain your answer briefly. (2 marks)
No. (1) It is because the configurations of a desktop computer may be changed at any time, for example, an additional hard disk may

be installed. Unlike the CMOS, the configuration cannot be updated in a ROM chip. (1)

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Long Questions

1. A newly designed portable game console works with a specially designed CPU. The CPU contains an ALU,
four general purpose registers and a 512 KB cache memory.

(a) (i) State the main function of the general purpose registers in a CPU. (2 marks)
They are used by instructions of assembly and machine code programs. (2)

(ii) State three examples of general purpose registers. (3 marks)

Accumulator (AX) / base register (BX) / counter (CX) / data register (DX)

(any three × 1)

(b) The game console does not work smoothly when an arithmetic intensive game is run. An engineer
proposes the following three methods to solve the problem.
Method 1: Implement more general purpose registers to the CPU.
Method 2: Redesign the CPU so that it can work with two ALUs at the same time.
Method 3: Implement up to 1 MB of cache memory.

(i) Explain how Method 1 can increase the processing speed of arithmetic intensive games. (2 marks)
Implementing more general purpose registers to the CPU provides more storage space for ALU (1) and CU (1) when executing

arithmetic operations.

(ii) Which method is most effective in increasing the processing speed of arithmetic intensive games?
Explain your answer briefly. (2 marks)
Method 3. (1) Because high cost is needed to implement more general purpose registers to the CPU and redesign the CPU while

cache memory can store data and instructions that have been recently used by the CPU. (1)

(iii) Arrange the three methods in ascending order of re-engineering cost. (3 marks)
3 < 1 < 2 (3)

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2. Tom wants to buy a new computer and he obtains the following advertisement from a computer shop.

SALE
Only $x,x
xx

(a) If the CPU of the stated computer takes four cycles to process one instruction, how many instructions
can the CPU execute per second? (3 marks)
The number of the instructions executed in 1 second
2.4 × 1,000
, × 1,000
, × 1,000
,
= (2)
4

= 600,000,000 (1)

(b) State the capacity of main memory in MB which have been installed in the computer. (2 marks)
Capacity of main memory = 256 + 2 (1)

= 258 MB (1)

(c) State one reason why the size of RAM is much larger than the size of ROM. (2 marks)
It is because ROM is mainly used to store BIOS, data supplied by the manufacturer and the bootstrap program which are small in sizes. (1)

But RAM is used to store the active application programs and data which take up a lot of memory space. (1)

(d) To have better a sound effect when playing computer games or watching DVDs, Tom wants to install a
powerful sound card and disable the on-board one. Where should he put the new interface card on the
motherboard? (1 mark)
Expansion slot (1)

(e) Tom has just installed an additional 256 MB RAM into the computer, but the computer fails to boot.
Give two possible reasons. (4 marks)
The specification of the new memory does not match with the existing one. / The installation of the new memory is improper. /

The information of the system stored in CMOS has not been updated. (any two × 2)