System Software, Architecture, Memory and Storage Practice Test

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• Which statement about volatile memory is true?
• Which are the four necessary deadlock conditions, and what is a common prevention strategy?
• What are program counters?
• Which statement describes a disadvantage of using a Command Line Interface?
• How does an operating system communicate with hardware?
• Which statement about cache warmth is true?
• Which memory synchronization primitive is used to protect a critical section so that only one thread can enter at a time?
• Which statement best describes the differences between paging and segmentation?
• Which statement accurately describes the architectural advantage of NVMe over older storage interfaces?
• Which approach is used to detect deadlocks after they occur (deadlock detection and recovery)?
• Which statement describes what happens on a TLB miss in hardware-assisted paging?
• Why does defragmentation benefit HDDs but not SSDs?
• In a multiprocessing system with virtual memory, what is the purpose of a TLB shootdown?
• What are the disadvantages of Hard Disk Drives (HDDs)?
• What is CPU affinity, and how does binding a process to a specific CPU or subset of CPUs affect scheduling on multi‑core systems?
• Which statement correctly describes how logical addresses are mapped to physical addresses in a system that uses paging or segmentation?
• What is the role of hardware virtualization features like VT-x/AMD-V and EPT/RVI?
• Why would OS use paged segmentation or combined paging and segmentation?
• Why is cache coherence necessary in multi-core systems?
• What is RAM?
• Which statement about HDDs is true?
• What does the Fetch Decode Execute cycle (FDE) do?
• Which statement best describes how containerization isolates resources and controls usage using namespaces and cgroups?
• Which statement best describes journaling and data integrity features among ext4, NTFS, and ZFS?
• What are device drivers?
• Which is an advantage of Magnetic Tapes?
• Which statement best describes the distinction between kernel space and user space?
• Why may an embedded system be used than general purpose systems?
• Which component stores frequently used data for fast access?
• Which statement about Secure Boot is true?
• What is virtual address space and how does it relate to physical memory?
• Under what conditions does thrashing occur, and what are common mitigation strategies?
• In Decode section of FDE, what happens?
• Which mechanism is used to ensure fair CPU time among processes?
• Which memory management approach uses per-page permissions and translation to map virtual pages to frames?
• Which sequence best describes the bootstrapping process and the kernel initialization sequence?
• Which cache level is the fastest and usually smallest in capacity?
• Which statement correctly describes Level 1, Level 2, and Level 3 caches?
• Which disk I/O scheduling algorithm minimizes head movement on spinning disks by sweeping from one end to the other?
• What is the role of page tables in paging?
• What does CPU performance rely on?
• Which statement best describes interrupts and interrupt handlers in a typical OS?
• Which of the following describes major OS-level performance bottlenecks and practical mitigation strategies such as batching I/O, prefetching, lazy loading, concurrency, and caching?
• In Linux/Unix-like systems, what is the role of device drivers and kernel modules?
• Which statement correctly describes paging as a memory management technique?
• Which of the following lists devices that are typically considered secondary storage?
• Which statement best describes primary storage?
• What is the primary purpose of reservation stations in a CPU pipeline?
• What is the benefit of encryption?
• How do local file systems compare to distributed file systems in metadata management and latency?
• Which unit is used to control the fetch-decode-execute cycle and data flow inside the CPU?
• What is the role of the Translation Lookaside Buffer (TLB) in memory management?
• What is a key architectural feature of distributed file systems like HDFS in contrast to local file systems?
• MDI refers to which type of interface?
• What is overclocking?
• What is an embedded system?
• What does x16 denote in PCIe lane configurations?
• Which of the following describes demand paging?
• Which statement best describes HDDs vs SSDs in terms of latency and maintenance needs?
• Which statement is true about a fast interrupt (FIQ) on architectures that implement it?
• Which of the following best describes how the operating system manages files?
• Which statement correctly contrasts block storage and object storage characteristics and typical use cases?
• Which statement differentiates synchronous I/O from asynchronous I/O?
• Which memory type is non-volatile and commonly stores firmware such as BIOS?
• Which IPC mechanism enables fast data transfer by sharing memory between processes?
• What are the advantages of Hard Disk Drives (HDDs)?
• Which statement best contrasts virtual machines and containers regarding isolation and overhead?
• Which statement best describes embedded systems?
• How do system calls enable user-space programs to request kernel services, and what is the typical transition mechanism?
• Which RAID level provides fault tolerance by distributing parity and can survive a single disk failure without data loss?
• What is a disadvantage of virtual memory?
• How do NVMe devices achieve high throughput on PCIe?
• Defragmentation software primarily does what?
• In the memory hierarchy, which layer typically provides the fastest access latency for CPU data?
• What is thrashing and how is it related to the working set of a process?
• What is fragmentation?
• What is the MAR?
• During the boot process, which of the following is commonly performed by BIOS?
• Which OS function helps manage storage space?
• What is the difference between hardware-assisted virtualization and paravirtualization?
• Which statement about memory consistency best describes sequential consistency?
• Which statement accurately describes the interrupt vector table and how the OS manages interrupt priorities (including priority levels, APICs, and nested/masked interrupts)?
• Which RAID level uses parity data distributed to tolerate two-drive failures?
• Which action is typically performed by the BIOS during boot?
• What is the role of the memory management unit in virtual memory?
• What are wear leveling and garbage collection in SSDs, and how do they affect performance?
• In an out-of-order CPU, what roles do reorder buffers and reservation stations play?
• What is ROM?
• What is the working set model and its role in paging decisions?
• Which IPC mechanism is unidirectional and forms a stream between related processes?
• Which scheduling statement correctly describes Round-robin scheduling?
• Which statement best describes a superscalar processor's ability?
• Which statement best describes inode-based file systems vs FAT-based file systems?
• During the Fetch phase of FDE, which sequence occurs?
• What happens to a blocked process when the I/O operation it is waiting on completes?
• What is a kernel and user space, and how does a system call transition from user to kernel mode?
• Which hardware component enforces address translation and protection in paging?
• Which RAID level provides double parity to tolerate two simultaneous drive failures?
• What is the primary benefit of Direct Memory Access (DMA) in I/O operations?
• Which statement about write-back caches is true?
• Which item is not typically considered a direct factor of CPU performance?
• What is the purpose of RAM?
• What are Interrupts and System Exceptions, and how does interrupt handling work in an OS?
• What can cause a context switch after an interrupt service routine completes?
• Which statement best captures the relationship between RISC and CISC in modern CPUs?
• What is GUI? GUI stands for Graphical User Interface and is presented using WIMP. Which of the following is included in WIMP?
• Which statement best describes the advantages of NVMe over SATA for SSDs?
• Which statement is true about a Command Line Interface (CLI)?
• Which statement best distinguishes synchronous I/O from asynchronous I/O and describes typical use cases?
• Which statement about symbolic links is true?
• Which register holds the data fetched from memory or to be written to memory?
• What are the advantages of Solid State Drives (SSDs)?
• Block storage is typically used for which workloads?
• Describe the hierarchical cache structure and common cache misses.
• WIMP is commonly associated with which interface concept?
• Which task is performed by the operating system to manage files?
• What are the advantages of Optical discs (CDs and DVDs)?
• Which device typically benefits from defragmentation?
• Which technique is commonly used to mitigate I/O latency and improve OS performance, such as batching I/O, asynchronous I/O, prefetching, and caching?
• What is a notable drawback of SSDs?
• Explain the difference between base+limit memory protection and paging-based protection.
• Which statement correctly defines a time-slice (quantum) in CPU scheduling?
• What is the CU?
• Which I/O scheduling algorithm tends to minimize seek distance by sweeping in one direction and then reversing?
• What is the advantage of having multiple cores on a CPU?
• How does increasing queue depth typically affect HDD throughput compared to SSD performance?
• Which factor is directly described by the working set model?
• Which unit keeps track of the next instruction address in the sequence?
• Which statement best describes the purpose of utility software?
• What is page fault frequency (PFF) and how does an operating system mitigate thrashing?
• Which IPC mechanism stores discrete messages rather than a continuous stream?
• Which of the following is a common role of the Memory Address Register (MAR) in the fetch step?
• What is primary storage?
• Where is BIOS stored?
• What are the disadvantages of Solid State Drives (SSDs)?
• Which of the following best describes the purpose of the Translation Lookaside Buffer (TLB) in memory management?
• What is virtual memory?
• Which of the following is a function of an operating system?
• What is a disadvantage of Magnetic Tapes?
• Which filesystem is known for copy-on-write with checksums, snapshots, and pooled storage?
• In the boot process, what is the primary role of POST performed by firmware?
• Which feature helps protect the boot process by loading only signed firmware and components?
• What is multitasking?
• In Execute section of FDE, what happens?
• Which statement is true about OS security features such as passwords, face ID, or fingerprint?
• Which statement about demand paging and program startup time is true?
• What is the function of the interrupt vector table in an OS, and how does prioritization (including APIC and nested interrupts) work?
• Paging, page tables, and page faults: When does a page fault occur?
• Which technique resolves data hazards in a classic CPU instruction pipeline?
• Which statement about queue depth is true?
• What is an operating system?
• What is the cache?
• Synchronous interrupts arise from which source?
• Which best explains the difference between HDDs and SSDs in seek time and random I/O performance?
• Which statement about BIOS and UEFI is true?
• What is memory locality and why does the memory hierarchy matter for CPU performance?
• For using GUI, which statement is true?
• What is virtual memory and how does it provide process isolation?
• Which RAID level combines striping with mirroring to provide both performance and redundancy?
• Which statement best distinguishes symmetric multiprocessing (SMP) from multicore architectures?
• What is a fixed-size memory frame in a paged system?
• In the context of operating systems, what does providing a UI refer to?
• In memory management using paging, which attributes are conveyed by a page table entry?
• What is the role of the write-ahead log in a journaling file system?
• What is the MDR?
• When does a page fault occur?
• What is a cache hit, and how can prefetching influence misses?
• What is compression?
• Which statement describes the CPU's purpose?
• Describe the role of a storage device driver and the OS I/O subsystem.
• What is secondary storage?
• Explain the differences between LRU, FIFO, CLOCK, and OPT page replacement algorithms, including typical strengths and weaknesses.
• Which cache miss occurs on the first access to a data block that has never been loaded into the cache?
• Which statement correctly describes address aliasing, cache coherence, and TLB considerations in a system with virtual memory?
• Which statement about page replacement algorithms is true?
• Which unit holds the address of where data or instructions will be fetched from or stored?
• What is the role of the kernel?
• Which statement best describes the Execute stage of the FDE cycle?
• Which statement best describes how fragmentation affects data access times?
• What is the primary purpose of multi-level paging?
• Which statement correctly describes hard links in a Unix-like file system?
• Which statement accurately describes pipelining and pipeline hazards?
• In instruction pipelining, which hazard is primarily caused by branches?
• Which strategy is used for deadlock avoidance by ensuring the system never enters an unsafe state, typically using the Banker's algorithm?
• Which synchronization primitive uses busy-waiting and is typically suitable for low-contention scenarios?
• When a file is written to disk, what may happen as a result of fragmentation?
• Describe page tables, multi-level paging, and inverted page tables, and explain why each is used.
• Which statement best describes NVMe in relation to SATA?
• Which devices are typically considered secondary storage?
• Which pipeline hazard is caused by conditional branches?
• What is a key benefit of virtual memory with demand paging?
• In an out-of-order CPU, what ensures that results are retired in program order?
• What is a page fault and typical handling steps?
• Which Coffman conditions constitute the conditions that allow deadlock to occur?
• What are 3 examples of embedded systems?
• What is the primary function of a page replacement algorithm in a virtual memory system?
• What does volatility mean?
• In the boot sequence, which component loads the kernel into memory after the bootloader has prepared the environment?
• Which unit performs calculations and logic operations?
• Explain internal vs external fragmentation and how paging eliminates external fragmentation.
• Describe the cache memory hierarchy and the MESI cache coherence protocol used in multi-core systems.
• What is the role of inodes, directories, and metadata in a file system?
• What are registers?
• What does SIMD stand for, and what is its basic idea?
• Which statement correctly defines clock speed in a CPU?
• What happens on a TLB miss?
• What is contained in a computer's BIOS?
• Which metric describes the delay of a single I/O operation?
• What is the role of a page table in virtual memory?
• What are accumulators?
• What is the purpose of journaling in file systems?
• Which statement best describes memory protection keys (MPK) and their role in per-page permissions?
• In RAID 5 and RAID 6, how does parity contribute to data protection?
• Which OS function deals with organizing and controlling access to files on storage devices?
• Which memory management scheme eliminates external fragmentation?
• Which set lists the major OS process lifecycle states?
• Which statement about preemptive and non-preemptive CPU scheduling is true?
• What is encryption?
• What is the primary role of an I/O scheduler in a storage subsystem?
• What is the difference between Type 1 and Type 2 hypervisors?
• Why is cache coherence important in multi-core systems?
• In the memory hierarchy, which sequence represents the fastest-to-slowest ordering?
• What is the advantage of having a bigger cache on a CPU?
• Which OS function is responsible for controlling access to resources and protecting data?
• Which synchronization primitive allows threads to wait for a condition to become true, typically used with producers and consumers?
• In memory allocators, what problem does memory compaction primarily address?
• Why is compression used?
• What is utility software?
• Define memory-mapped I/O and its advantages over port-mapped I/O.
• Which statement best describes memory-mapped I/O?
• How does memory protection isolate processes in a modern OS?
• Which statement best describes preemptive CPU scheduling?
• Object storage is best suited for which type of data?
• What is the purpose of TRIM in SSD maintenance?
• Which of the following is a disadvantage of Optical discs (CDs and DVDs)?
• Which statement correctly describes a superscalar processor?
• What is the role of the TLB and what happens on a TLB miss?
• Which component is primarily responsible for translating logical addresses to physical addresses in a paging system?
• What is a page fault handler and what steps are typically performed to bring a page into memory?
• Which RAID level offers mirroring for redundancy?