(SEM III) THEORY EXAMINATION 2022-23 COMPUTER ORGANIZATION AND ARCHITECTURE

This question paper is designed for students studying Computer Organization and Architecture at the undergraduate engineering level. The paper evaluates a student’s conceptual understanding and analytical ability related to the internal functioning of computer systems, focusing on how hardware components interact to execute instructions efficiently.

The structure of the paper follows a balanced and comprehensive format, covering foundational theories as well as applied problem-solving skills. Students are expected to demonstrate clarity in concepts such as instruction cycles, memory operations, addressing modes, CPU design, pipelining, floating-point representation, cache mapping, control unit operations, and I/O subsystem architecture.

SECTION A

This section contains short-answer questions aimed at testing fundamental knowledge. Topics include instruction cycle steps, memory operations, processor buses, hit–miss ratios, RISC vs CISC differences, SRAM vs DRAM characteristics, virtual memory, I/O functions, and DMA operations. Each question requires brief but precise explanations.

SECTION B

This section includes medium-length descriptive and analytical questions. Students must answer any three. It covers in-depth explanations of functional units of a computer, IEEE-754 floating point representation, pipeline processing, cache memory mapping techniques, and various types of interrupts. Problem-solving questions in this section test computational ability and understanding of architectural principles.

SECTION C

This section includes long, detailed questions meant to assess higher-order thinking, application, and derivation of concepts. Students are required to attempt one question from each pair.
Questions may include stack organization in processors, effective address calculation using different addressing modes, derivation of look-ahead carry adders, Booth’s multiplication algorithm, assembly-level program writing using different instruction formats, memory hierarchy details, secondary storage technologies, DMA controller architecture, and input/output interface design.

Overall, the paper aims to test a student’s ability to:

Understand the architecture of modern computer systems

Analyse and design basic digital computing operations

Apply numerical and logical methods for solving architecture-related problems

Demonstrate strong foundational knowledge for advanced computing concepts