Study Guide for Test 2 Test 2 will be held on Monday, 30 July 2007. Here are some questions that covers the material for Test 2. The problems on the test will be similar to the problems given here. Memory * Discuss the pros and cons using SRAM and DRAM. * What is the role played by cache? * What is the BIOS? * When would you use virtual memory? Problems similar to these- * What is the address space for a 16-bit machine in KiloBytes? * If you have 256 MB of RAM in your computer, how many bits do you need to address all that memory? Instruction Set Architecture * What do you understand by Instruction Set Architecture? Give three general classes of instructions with examples. * In what ways is the RISC philosophy different from CISC in the design of a processor? * If you had to write code in assembly language which type of instruction set architecture would you prefer - RISC or CISC? Why? Problems similar to these - * Flip all the bits of the value stored in register R5. * Jump to the instruction whose address in given in register R7. * In the LC-3 register R1 has a 16-bit positive number. Show how you can place the 2's complement of that value in register R2. * In the LC-3 you have values stored in registers R1 and R2. Give the steps that will you to place the result of (R1 OR R2) in register R3. Computer Performance * What is pipelining and how does it save time? * What causes a pipeline stall? * What do you understand by benchmarking? Give an example of a benchmark suite. * Give a measurable definition of performance. If you were a chip designer list three things you could do to improve performance. * Problems similar to this - AMD Athlon chip with a clock rate of 600 MHz is rated 2.4 GFLOPS. How many floating point operations can it perform in one clock cycle? Basic Computer Parts * What is a device driver? * What is firmware? * What is a capacitive keyboard and why is it better than a resistive keyboard? * When the BIOS does a POST what is it doing? * Distinguish between a D-shell connector and DIN connector. * What is a port? Give three examples of ports. * What are the differences between a serial and parallel port? * What are some devices that are connected to serial ports and to parallel ports? * What is firewire? * Distinguish between RJ-11 and RJ-45 connectors. The Motherboard * Distinguish between MMX, SSE, and 3DNOW! * Distinguish between a Front Side Bus and Back Side Bus. * Distinguish between AGP and PCI-X expansion slots. * What does bus mastering mean? * What is the role of a chipset on the motherboard? * What does form factor mean? Memory * A memory chip has been advertised as ubuffered SDRAM. Explain what that means to you. * What is DDR Ram? * Draw the memory map for a Pentium processor showing the memory range reserved for ROM chips. * Distinguish between Application Memory and Shared System Memory space on the memory map.