Home C C++ Java Python Perl PHP SQL JavaScript Linux Selenium QT Online Test

Home » Basic Computer Questions

Basic Computer Technical Interview Questions

These technical questions are prepared for those who wants to have atleast basic knowledge of Computer Science. Questions are very useful for individual preparing for entrance exams by IT companies.

Question 1. Numbers are stored and transmitted inside a computer in
(a) binary form (b) ASCII code form (c) decimal form (d) alphanumeric form

Question 2. The original ASCII codes
(a) were 7 bits (b) 8 bits (c) represented 256 characters (d) represented 127 characters

Question 3. The ASCII code of ‘A’ is
(a) 66D (b) 41H (c) 0100 0010 (d) 0110 0011

Question 4. The ASCII code of ‘0’ (zero) is
(a) 48D, (b) 32H (c) 0011 1000 (d) 42H

Question 5. The 4-bit binary number 0111 represents
(a) 15, (b) -7 (c) 7 (d) -1

Question 6. The decimal number 255 may be represented by
(a) 1111 1111B, (b) 1000 0000B, (c) EEEEH, (d) 0111 1111

Question 7. The 8-bit binary number 1111 1111 represents
(a) 255, (b) -255 (c) -127 (d) -1

Question 8. The decimal number 127 may be represented by
(a) 1111 1111B, (b) 1000 0000B, (c) EEH, (d) 0111 1111

Question 9. A byte corresponds to
(a) 4 bits (b) 8 bits (c) 16 bits (d) 32 bits

Question 10. The storage required for an image such as an X-ray is approximately
(a) a few bytes (b)a few hundred bytes (c) a few gigabytes (d) in the megabyte range.

Question 11. A gigabyte represents
(a) 1 billion bytes (b) 1000 kilobytes (c) 230 bytes (d) 1024 bytes

Question 12. A megabyte represents
(a) 1 million bytes (b) 1000 kilobytes (c) 220 bytes (d) 1024 bytes

Question 13. A Kb corresponds to
(a) 1024 bits (b) 1000 bytes (c) 21 0 bytes (d) 210 bits

Question 14. A superscalar processor has
(a) multiple functional units (b) a high clock speed (c) a large amount of RAM (d) many I/O ports

Question 15. A 32-bit processor has
(a) 32 registers (b) 32 I/O devices (c) 32 Mb of RAM (d) a 32-bit bus or 32-bit registers

Question 16. Information is stored and transmitted inside a computer in
(a) binary form (b) ASCII code form (c) decimal form (d) alphanumeric form

Question 17. The minimum number of bits required to store the hexadecimal number FF is
(a) 2, (b) 4, (c) 8, (d) 16

Question 18. A parity bit is
(a) used to indicate uppercase letters (b) used to detect errors (c) is the first bit in a byte (d) is the last bit in a byte

Question 19. A 20-bit address bus allows access to a memory of capacity
(a) 1 Mb (b) 2 Mb (c) 32Mb (d) 64 Mb

Question 20. A 32-bit address bus allows access to a memory of capacity
(a) 64 Mb (b) 16 Mb (c) 1 Gb (d) 4 Gb

Question 21. Clock speed is measured in
(a) bits per second (b) baud (c) bytes (d) Hertz

Question 22. On-chip cache has
(a) lower access time than RAM (b) larger capacity than off chip cache (c) its own data bus (d) become obsolete


Question 23. An FPU
(a) makes integer arithmetic faster (b) makes pipelining more efficient (c) increases RAM capacity (d) makes some arithmetic calculations faster

Question 24. Pipelining improves CPU performance due to
(a) reduced memory access time (b) increased clock speed (c) the introduction of parallellism (d) additional functional units

Question 25. The system bus is made up of
(a) data bus (b) data bus and address bus (c) data bus and control bus (d) data bus, control bus and address bus

Question 26. The von Neumann bottleneck is due to
(a) mismatch in speed between secondary and primary storage (b) mismatch in speed between the CPU and primary storage (c) slow speed of I/O devices (d) low clock speeds

Question 27. Cache memory enhances
(a) memory capacity (b) memory access time (c) secondary storage capacity (d) secondary storage access time

Question 28. Cache memory
(a) has greater capacity than RAM (b) is faster to access than CPU registers (c) is permanent storage (d) faster to access than DRAM

Question 29. A machine cycle refers to
(a) fetching an instruction (b) clock speed (c) fetching, decoding and executing an instruction (d)executing an instruction

Question 30. CISC machines
(a) have fewer instructions than RISC machines (b) use more RAM than RISC machines (c) have medium clock speeds (d) use variable size instructions

Question 31. RISC machines typically
(a) have high capacity on-chip cache memories (b) have fewer registers than CISC machines (c) are less reliable than CISC machines (d) typically execute 1 instruction per clock cycle.

Question 32. CPU performance may be measured in
(a) BPS (b) MIPS (c) MHz (d) VLSI

Question 33. Modern processor chips may be classified as
(a) LSI (b) ULSI (c) MIPS (d) SSI

Question 34. Silicon chips are becoming more complex because
(a) die size is decreasing (b) feature size is decreasing (c) yield is increasing (d) the scale of integration is decreasing

Question 35. Accessing disk storage is slower than accessing RAM by an order of
(a) 10 (b) 100 (c) 1000 (d) 100,000

Question 36. The typical disk storage capacity of a PC is of the order of
(a) 32 MB (b) 2 Gb (c) 2 Tb (d) 5120 Kb

Question 37. Disk access takes of the order of
(a) x millisecs (b) x microsecs (c) x/100 secs (d) xnanosecs

Question 38. RAM access takes of the order of
(a) x millisecs (b) x microsecs (c) x/100 secs (d) x nanosecs

Question 39. Cache memory access takes of the order of
(a) x millisecs (b) x microsecs (c) x secs (d) x nanosecs

Question 40. Accessing RAM is slower than accessing cache memory by an order of
(a) 10 (b) 100 (c) 200 (d) 50

Question 41. Optical tape storage
(a) has faster access time than disk storage (b) smaller capacity than CD-ROM (c) greater capacity than DAT storage (d) smaller capacity than DAT storage

Question 42. DIP involves the use of a
(a) scanner (b) plotter (c) microphone (d) CD-ROM


Question 43. The typical RAM capacity of a PC is of the order of
(a) 32 MB (b) 16 Gb (c) 16 Tb (d) 512 Kb

Question 44. Modem speeds are measured in
(a) bps (b) kbps (c) mbps (d) mips

Question 45. LAN speeds are measured in
(a) bps (b) Kbps (c) Mbps (d) Mips

Question 46. WAN speeds are
(a) usually higher than LAN speeds (b) measured in bytes per second (c) depend on the transmission medium (d) limited by modem speeds

Question 47. Accessing the Internet from a typical home PC requires the use of
(a) CD-ROM drive (b) a modem (c) Windows 95 (d) Netscape

Question 48. To use the Internet you
(a) must use the World Wide Web (b) must use electronic mail (c) use appropriate communications software (d) must have a LAN account

Question 49. A Pentium processor comprises
(a) more than 1 million transistors (b) more than 3 million transistors (c) 500,000 transistors (d) 900,000 transistors


Question 50. Which of the following is NOT a type of processor
(a) PowerPC 601 (b) Motorola 8086 (c) Motorola 68000 (d) Intel Pentium


Question 51. Apple Macintoshs were originally based on the
(a) Intel 80x86 processor family (b) Motorola 68000 family (c) Motorola 6800 family (d) PowerPc family


Question 52. IBM PC’s were originally based on the
(a) Intel 80x86 processor family (b) Motorola 68000 family (c) Motorola 6800 family (d) PowerPc family


Question 53. IBM used as the operating system for their original PC
(a) MS-DOS (b)Windows 3.1 (c) PC-DOS (d) DOS


Question 54. Windows (GUI) software originated on
(a) IBM computers (b) Apple Macintosh computers (c) Rank Xerox computers (d) Digital (DEC) computers

Question 55. A RAID system is useful because
(a) it increases processor speed (b) increases disk storage capacity (c) increases disk storage capacity and availability (d) increases OS efficiency

Question 56. In processing cheques which of the following I/O techniques have banks traditionally used
(a) OCR (b) MICR (c) barcode scanning (d) voice recognition

Question 57. An RS-232 interface is
(a) a parallel interface (b) a serial interface (c) printer interface (d) a modem interface

Question 58. Which of the following is NOT a computer performance metric:
(a) MIPS, (b) FLOPS, (c) SPECmark, (d) RISC

Question 59. For print quality you would expect best results from
(a) line printer (b) dot matrix printer (c) ink-jet printer (d) laser printer.

Question 60. Handling dates in the next century is a serious problem for the computing industry. Which of the following does NOT refer to this problem:
(a) Y2K problem (b) Year 2000 problem (c) Millennium bug (d) Next century problem.

Question 61. ROM
(a) is faster to access than RAM (b) is non-volatile (c) stores more information than RAM (d) is used for cache memory

Question 62. DRAM
(a) is used for cache memory (b) is more expensive than SRAM (c) is cheaper than SRAM (d) is only used at boot up time

Question 63. SRAM
(a) is cheaper than DRAM (b) is used at boot up time only (c) is used for cache memory (d) is slower to access than DRAM

Question 64. 10-Base-T refers to
(a) Ethernet using thin coaxial cable (b) Ethernet using thick coaxial cable (c) Ethernet using unshielded twisted pair (utp) cabling (d) none of the previous

Question 65. 10-Base-2 refers to
(a) Ethernet using thin coaxial cable (b) Ethernet using thick coaxial cable (c) Ethernet using unshielded twisted pair (utp) cabling (d) none of the previous

Question 66. 10-Base-5 refers to
(a) Ethernet using thin coaxial cable (b) Ethernet using thick coaxial cable (c) Ethernet using unshielded twisted pair (utp) cabling (d) none of the previous

Question 67. The maximum recommended segment length for utp is
(a) 200 metres (b) 100 metres (c) 500 metres (d) 1000 metres

Question 68. A UPS
(a) increased the storage capacity of a computer system (b) increases the process speed (c) provides backup power in the event of a power cut (d) none of the previous

Question 69. An NOS is
(a) a proprietary operating system (b) a network operating system (c) Novell Operating System (d) Unix-like operating system

Question 70. An NIC
(a) a Novell Interface Controller (b) used to control a printer (c) interfaces a modem to a computer (d) connects a computer to a network

Question 71. The capacity of a 3.5” floppy is around
(a) 100K (b) 1.4 Mb (c) 5 Mb (d) 1 Gb

Question 72. The capacity of a 3.5” Zip disk is around
(a) 5 Mb (b) 10 Mb (c) 40 Mb (d) 100 Mb

Question 73. When accessing a disk the amount of data transferred is
(a) one track (b) one sector (block) (c) one cylinder (d) 1 byte

Question 74. A hard disk spins at x revolutions per minute where x is
(a) 300 - 900 (b) 30 - 90 (c) 3000 - 9000 (d) 100,000

Question 75. The largest delay in accessing data on disk is due to
(a) seek time (b) rotation time (c) data transfer time (d) none of the previous

Question 76. CD-ROM capacity is around
(a) 100 Mb (b) 650 Mb (c) 1 Gb (d) 4 Gb

Question 77. The capacity of a DVD is around
(a) 100 Mb (b) 650 Mb (c) 1.4 Gb (d) 4.7 Gb

Question 78. The capacity of DAT is
(a) 100 Mb (b) 650 Mb (c) 1 Gb (d) several gigabytes

Question 79. A smart card
(a) is a form of ATM card (b) has more storage capacity than an ATM card (c) is an access card for a security system (d) contains a microprocessor

Question 80. The resolution of a VGA screen is
(a) 1024 x 768 (b) 512 x 512 (c) 640 x 480 (d) 800 x 600

Question 79. Laser printers usually print at
(a) 200 dpi (b) 360 dpi (c) 600 dpi (d) 10,000 dpi

Question 80. High print quality requires from
(a) 600 dpi (b) 300 dpi (c) 1000 dpi (d)100,000 dpi


Question 81. Laptop computers use
(a) CRT displays (b) LCD displays (c) SSGA displays (d) none of the previous

Question 82. QWERTY is used with reference to
(a) screen layout (b) mouse button layout (c) keyboard layout (d) word processing software

Question 83. A “killer application” is
(a) software that is hard to debug ! (b) a form of computer virus (c) a really popular application program (d) none of the previous

Question 84. WYSIWYG is used with reference to
(a) screen layout (b) mouse button layout (c) keyboard layout (d) screen images that resemble printed documents

Question 85. A GUI is
(a) hardware (b) language interpreter (c) software interface (d) an operating system

Question 86. Multiprogramming refers to
(a) having several programs in RAM at the same time (b) multitasking (c) writing programs in multiple languages (d) none of the previous

Question 87. Multitasking refers to
(a) having several programs in RAM at the same time (b) the ability to run 2 or more programs concurrently (c) writing programs in multiple languages (d) none of the previous

Question 88. Multiprogramming is a prerequisite for
(a) multitasking (b) an operating system (c) to run more than one program at the same time (d) none of the above

Question 89. Timesharing is the same as
(a) multitasking (b) multiprogramming (c) multiuser (d) none of the previous

Question 90. Virtual memory is
(a) related to virtual reality (b) a form of ROM (c) a form of RAM (d) none of the previous

Question 91. Multiprocessing is
(a) same as multitasking (b) same as multiprogramming (c) multiuser (d) involves using more than one processor at the same time

Question 92. The most widely used network operating system on PC LANs is
(a) Linux (b) Novell Netware (c) Unix (d) Windows NT

Question 93. Disk fragmentation
(a) is caused by wear (b) caused by overuse (c) is due to bad disk blocks (d) none of the previous

Question 94. A compiler is
(a) a fast interpreter (b) slower than an interpreter (c) converts a program to machine code (d) none of the previous

Question 95. An interpreter is
(a) faster than a compiler (b) translates and executes programs statement by statement (c) converts a program to machine code (d) none of the previous

Question 96. JPEG and MPEG
(a) have to do with compression of graphics and video (b) have to do with Web pages (c) the Internet (d) none of the previous

Question 97. “Zipping” a file means
(a) encrypting it (b) decrypting it (c) compressing it (d) transmitting it

Question 98. The speed of transferring data with your modem is governed by
(a) the speed of the your modem (b) the speed of the receiving modem (c) the speed of transmitting/receiving modems (d) the distance between the modems

Question 99. ISDN speeds are
(a) faster than ATM speeds (b) slower than ATM speeds (c) same as modem speeds (d) same as ADSL speeds

Question 100. A cable modem uses
(a) LAN cable (b) cable-TV cable (c) is same speed as conventional modem (d) optic fibre cables


Question 101. A client-server system is based on
(a) mainframe technology (b) WAN technology (c)LAN technology (d) Unix operating system

Question 102. A multiplexor is a form of
(a) hub (b) modem (c) bridge (d) none of the previous

Question 103. A hub is a
(a) router (b) a bridge (c) repeater (d) all of the previous

Question 104. A search engine is
(a) hardware (b) IR system for the Internet (c) browser (d) none of the previous

Question 105. An ISP
(a) provides access to the Internet (b) is a CPU register (c) is a CPU functional unit (d) make of processor

Question 106. FTP is
(a) used to send email (b) used to browse the Web (c) is part of Netscape (d) is a protocol for the transfer of files between computers

Question 107. Telnet
(a) used to send email (b) uses telephone lines (c) is part of Netscape (d) is a protocol that allows for remote login

Question 108. A firewall is
(a) used to protect a computer room from fires and floods (b) a form of virus (c) a screen saver program (d) none of the previous

Question 109. A proxy server is
(a) a backup server (b) an email server (c) a poor file server (d) none of the above

Question 110. An RDBMS is a
(a) remote DBMS (b) relative DBMS (c) Relational DBMS (d) Reliable DBMS

Question 111. Data Warehousing refers to
(a) storing data offline at a separate site (b) backing up data regularly (c) is related to data mining (d) uses tape as opposed to disk

Question 112. A 4GL is
(a) DBMS system (b) uses Java (c) uses C++ (d) none of the previous.

Question 113. The Pentium processor is
(a) 16-bit (b) 32-bit (c) 64 bit (d) 8-bit

Question 114. The IBM/Motorola PowerPC 601 processor is
(a) 16-bit (b) 32-bit (c) 64 bit (d) 8-bit

Question 115. The Motorola 68000 processor is
(a) 16-bit (b) 32-bit (c) 64 bit (d) 8-bit

Question 116. The Digital Alpha processor is
(a) 16-bit (b) 32-bit (c) 64 bit (d) 8-bit

Question 117. Apple’s iMac uses a
(a) ISA bus (b) NuBus (c) PCI bus (d) USB bus

Question 118. Which of the following is NOT a bus standard
(a) EISA (b) VME (c) MCA (d) RS-232

Question 119. A nanosecond is
(a) 10-6 sec (b) 10-3 sec (c) 10-12 sec (d) 10-9 sec

Question 120. The feature size of a Pentium is approx.
(a) 1 micron (b) 0.1 microns (c) 4 microns (d) .4 microns


Question 121. The resolution of an SVGA screen is
(a) 1024 x 768 (b) 512 x 512 (c) 640 x 480 (d)800 x 800

Question 122. A 5 stage pipeline with the stages taking 1, 1, 3, 1, 1, units of time has a throughput of
(a) 1/3 (b) 1/7 (c) 7 (d) 3

Question 123. Given a 5 stage pipeline with stages taking 1, 2, 3, 2, 1 units of time, the throughput of the pipeline is:
(a) 9 (b) 1/9 (c) 1/3 (d) 2

Question 124. Given a 5 stage pipeline with stages taking 1, 2, 3, 1, 1 units of time, the clock period of the pipeline is:
(a) 8 (b) 1/8 (c) 1/3 (d) 3

Question 125. Given a 5 stage pipeline with stages taking 1, 2, 3, 1, 1 units of time, the flowthrough time of the pipeline is:
(a) 8 (b) 1/8 (c) 1/3 (d) 3

Question 126. The average memory access time for a machine with a cache hit rate of 90% where the cache access time is 10ns and the memory access time is 100ns is
(a) 55ns, (b) 45ns, (c) 90ns, (d) 19ns

Question 127. The clock speed of a modern PC is of the order of
(a) 400 Khz (b) 400 Hz (c) 400 Mhz (c) 400 Ghz

Question 128. Given that the subprogram putc displays the character in al, the effect of the following instructions: mov al, ‘c’ sub al, 2 call putc is to
(a) display 2 (b) display 'c' (c) display 'a' (d) display a blank

Question 129. Given that the bl register contains ‘b’, the effect of the following instruction and bl, 1101 1111 is to
(a) clear bl (b) store ‘B’ in bl (c) store 0010 0000 in bl (d) leave bl unchanged

Question 130. Which of the following is an illegal instruction
(a) MoV Ax, 30000 (b) iNc Al, 1 (c) aNd bx, bx (d) add ax, 30

Question 131. An OR gate generates a low output when
(a) any one of its inputs is low (b) all of its inputs are high (c) when all of its inputs are low (d) power fails

Question 132. Given that the subprogram putc displays the character in al, the effect of the following instructions: mov al, ‘a’ add al, 2 call putc is to
(a) display 2 (b) display c (c) display a (d) display a blank

Question 133. Given that the bl register contains ‘B’, the effect of the following instruction or bl, 0010 0000 is to
(a) clear bl (b) store ‘b’ in bl (c) store 0010 0000 in bl (d) leave bl unchanged

Question 133b. Given that the bl register contains ‘B’, which of the following instructions will change bl so that it contains 'b'
(a) or bl, 0010 0000 (b) and bl, 0010 0000 (c) or bl, 1101 1111 in bl (d) and bl, 1101 1111

Question 133c. Given that the bl register contains ‘b’, which of the following instructions will change bl so that it contains 'B'
(a) or bl, 0010 0000 (b) and bl, 0010 0000 (c) or bl, 1101 1111 in bl (d) and bl, 1101 1111

Question 134. Which of the following is an illegal instruction
(a) MoV Ax, 30000 (b) iNc Al (c) aNd bx, bx (d) add ax 30

Question 135. An AND gate generates a high output when
(a) any one of its inputs is high (b) all of its inputs are high (c) when all of its inputs are low (d) power fails

Question 136. Given that the subprogram putc displays the character in al, the effect of the following instructions: mov al, ‘0’ add al, 2 call putc is to
(a) display ‘2’ (b) display '3' (c) display '0' (d) display a blank

Question 137. Given that the bl register contains 1111 0000, the effect of the following instruction or bl, 0000 1111 is to
(a) clear bl (b) store 1111 1111 in bl (c) store 0000 1111 in bl (d) leave bl unchanged

Question 138. Which of the following is an illegal 8086 instruction
(a) mov 20, bx (b) iNc Al (c) aNd bx, bx (d) add ax, 30

Question 139. Which of the following is an illegal l8086 instruction
(a) mov ax, [bx] (b) iNc [bx] (c) aDd bx, [bx] (d) add ax, [cx]

Question 140. Which of the following is an illegal 8086 instruction
(a) mov ax, [bx] (b) iNc [bx] (c) aDd bx, [dx] (d) add [bx], 1


Question 141. Which of the following is an illegal 8086 instruction
(a) ret 2 (b) push al (c) aDd bx, 25000 (d) and ax, dx

Question 142. The net effect of calling the following subprogram in terms of program behaviour: Subprog: push ax add ax, 10 ret is to
(a) leave ax unchanged (b) add 10 to ax (c) cause the program to behave in an unpredictable manner (d) do nothing

Question 143. Branch prediction is used in the context of
(a) pipelining (b) program loops (c) cache memory (d) ALU operation

Question 144. Delayed branching is used
(a) to introduce delays in program execution (b) in pipelining (c) in cache memory (d) decoding instructions

Question 145. A Harvard architecture means that a machine has
(a) separate memories for data and instructions (b) unified cache memory (c) multiple functional units (d) an on-chip cache
Question 146. Which is the most complex component of the following
(a) transistor (b) flip flop (c) AND gate (d) decoder

Question 147. An assembly language instruction
(a) always has a label (b) always takes at least 1 operand (c) always has an operation field (c) always modifies the status register

Question 148. An arithmetic instruction always modifies the
(a) stack pointer (b) status register (c) program counter (d) an index register

Question 149. A conditional jump instruction
(a) always cause a transfer of control (b) always involves the use of the status register (c) always modifies the program counter (d) always involves testing the Zero flag

Question 150. An interrupt instruction
(a) causes an unconditional transfer of control (b) causes a conditional transfer of control (c) modifies the status register (d) is an I/O instruction

Question 151. A data movement instruction will
(a) modify the status register (b) modify the stack pointer (c) modify the program counter (d) transfer data from one location to another

Question 152. The memory address register is used to store
(a) data to be transferred to memory (b) data that has been transferred from memory (c) the address of a memory location (d) an instruction that has been transferred from memory.

Question 153. The memory data register is used to store
(a) data to be transferred to or from memory (b) data to be transferred to the stack (c) the address of a memory location (d) an instruction that has been transferred from memory

Question 154. The instruction register stores
(a) an instruction that has been decoded (b) an instruction that has been fetched from memory (c) an instruction that has been executed (d) the address of the next instruction to be executed

Question 155. The program counter
(a) stores the address of the instruction that is currently being executed (b) stores the next instruction to be executed (c) stores the address of the next instruction to be executed (d) stores the instruction that is being currently executed.

Question 156. The stack pointer stores
(a) the address of the stack in memory (b) address of the last item pushed on the stack (c) the address of the next free stack location (d) the address of the last item popped from the stack

Question 157. The read/write line is
(a) belongs to the data bus (b) belongs to the control bus (c) belongs to the address bus (d) CPU bus

Question 158. The instruction inc I where I is a memory variable involves
(a) a memory read operation (b) a memory write operation (c) a memory read and a memory write operation (c) only an arithmetic operation

Question 159. Memory mapped I/O involves
(a) transferring information between memory locations (b) transferring information between registers and memory (c) transferring information between the CPU and I/O devices in the same way as between the CPU and memory (d) transferring information between I/O devices and memory

Question 160. Busy waiting is a technique
(a) to allow the CPU wait for a busy device (b) to allow a busy device wait for the CPU (c) to keep an idle device busy (d) improve CPU performance


Question 161. A hardware interrupt is
(a) also called an internal interrupt (b) also called an external interrupt (c) an I/O interrupt (d) a clock interrupt

Question 162. An assembly language program is typically
(a) non-portable (b) shorter than an equivalent HLL program (c) harder to read than a machine code program (d) slower to execute than a compiled HLL program

Question 163. Programs are written in assembly language because they
(a) run faster than HLL programs (b) are portable (c) easier to write than machine code programs (d) they allow the programmer access to registers or instructions that are not usually provided by a HLL

Question 164. An assembly language program is translated to machine code by
(a) an assembler (b) a compiler (c) an interpreter (d) a linker

Question 165. An assembly language directive is
(a) the same as an instruction (b) used to define space for variables (c)used to start a program (d) to give commands to an assembler

Question 166. Which of the following is not an MASM directive
(a) .stack (b) db (c) .model (d) call

Question 167. When a program is translated by the MASM assembler, the machine code is stored in a file with the extension
(a) .lis (b) .obj (c) .exe (d) .out

Question 167. The output of the linker (LINK command) is stored in a file with the extension
(a) .lis (b) .obj (c) .exe (d) .lnk

Question 168. Which of the following is not part of the processor
(a) the ALU (b) the CU (c) the registers (d) the system bus
Question 169. Which of the following variables uses the most amount of RAM:
(a) x db 255 (b) y db 80 dup(‘Z’) (c) z dw 50 dup(0) (d) small dd 40 dup(0)

Question 170. Which of the following defines a constant Max
(a) Max db 80 (b) Max equ 80 (c) Max dw 80 (d) mov Max, 80

Question 171. The result of mov al, 65 is to store
(a) 0100 0010 in al, (b) ASCII code of ‘A’ in al, (c) store 42H in al (d) store 1000 0001 in al

Question 172. The call instruction is used to
(a) access subprograms (b) access memory (c) perform I/O (d) access the stack

Question 173. The effect of the following instructions push ax add ax, 4 pop bx mov cx, ax push bx pop ax on the ax register is
(a) leave it with its original value (b) add 4 to it (c) clear it (d) double it

Question 174. To copy the hexadecimal number A to the bh register you write
(a) mov 0bh, ah (b) mov bh, 0ah (c) mov bh, ah (d) mov bh, [ah]

Question 175. The effect of the following instructions mov ah, 2h int 21h is to
(a) read a character into al (b) read a character into dl (c) display the character in al (d) display the character in dl

Question 176. The effect of the following instructions mov ah, 1h int 21h is to
(a) read a character into al (b) read a character into dl (c) display the character in al (d) display the character in dl

Question 177. Given that al contains the ASCII code of an uppercase letter, it can be converted to lowercase by
(a) add al, 32 (b) sub al, 32 (c) or al, 1101 1111 (d) and al, 0010 0000

Question 178. Given that al contains the ASCII code of a lowercase letter, it can be converted to uppercase by
(a) add al, 32 (b) sub al, 32 (c) or al, 1101 1111 (d) and al, 0010 0000

Question 179. Given that al contains the ASCII code of an uppercase letter, it can be converted to lowercase by
(a) add al, 30 (b) sub al, 30 (c) or al, 0010 0000 (d) and al, 0010 0000

Question 180. Given that al contains the ASCII code of a lowercase letter, it can be converted to uppercase by
(a) add al, 32 (b) sub al, 30 (c) or al, 1101 1111 (d) and al, 1101 1111


Question 181. The instruction jg operates with
(a) unsigned numbers (b) 2’s complement numbers (c) floating point numbers (d) ASCII codes

Question 182. The instruction ja operates with
(a) unsigned numbers (b) signed numbers (c) floating point numbers (d) ASCII codes

Question 183. The instruction mov str[si], ‘a’ is an example of
(a) indirect addressing (b) indexed addressing (c) direct addressing (d) register addressing

Question 184. The instruction mov ax, [bx] is an example of
(a) indirect addressing (b) indexed addressing (c) direct addressing (d) based addressing

Question 185. The instruction je label is an example of
(a) indirect addressing (b) indexed addressing (c) relative addressing (d) immediate addressing

Question 186. The word size of an 8086 processor is
(a) 8 bits (b) 16 bits (c) 32 bits (d) 64 bits

Question 187. The code used to boot up a computer is stored in
(a) RAM (b) ROM (c) PROM and (d) EPROM

Question 188. In accessing a disk block the longest delay is due to
(a) rotation time (b) seek time (c) transfer time (d) clock speed

Question 189. Given that putc displays a character, the following code mov al, ‘a’ add al, 2 and al, 1101 1111 call putc is to
(a) display 2 (b) display ‘c’ (c) display ‘C’ (d) display ‘A’

Question 190. Given that bl contains ‘B’ the effect of the following code or bl, 0010 0000 add bl, 2 is to
(a) clear bl, (b) store ‘b’ in bl (c) store 0110 0001 in bl (d) store ‘d’ in bl

Question 191. The average memory access time for a machine with a cache hit rate of 90% where the cache access time is 10ns and the memory access time is 100ns is
(a) 55ns, (b) 45ns, (c) 90ns, (d) 19ns

Question 192. Which of the following is NOT involved in a memory write operation:
(a) MAR, (b) PC, (c) MDR, (d) Data Bus

193. Pipelining improves CPU performance due to
(a) reduced memory access time (b) increased clock speed (c) the introduction of parallellism (d) additional functional units

Question 194. DRAM
(a) is used for cache memory (b) is more expensive than SRAM (c) is cheaper than SRAM (d) is only used at boot up time

Question 195. SRAM
(a) is cheaper than DRAM (b) is used at boot up time only (c) is used for cache memory (d) is slower to access than DRAM

Question 196. WYSIWYG is used with reference to
(a) screen layout (b) mouse button layout (c) keyboard layout (d) screen images that resemble printed documents

Question 197. A GUI is
(a) hardware (b) language interpreter (c) software interface (d) an operating system

Question 199. FTP is
(a) used to send email (b) used to browse the Web (c) is part of Netscape (d) is a protocol for the transfer of files between computers

Question 200. Telnet
(a) used to send email (b) uses telephone lines (c) is part of Netscape (d) is a protocol that allows for remote login


Question 201. Which of the following is an illegal 8086 instruction
(a) ret 2 (b) push ax (c) aDd bx, 25000 (d) mov x, ay

Question 202. The read/write line is
(a) belongs to the data bus (b) belongs to the control bus (c) belongs to the address bus (d) CPU bus

203. The call instruction stores the return address for a subprogram
(a) on the stack (b) in the memory address register (c) in the program counter (d) does not involve using the return address

Question 204. The instruction je label is an example of
(a) indirect addressing (b) indexed addressing (c) relative addressing (d) immediate addressing

Question 205. Given that dl contains 'x' which of the following will cause 'x' to be displayed:
(a) mov ah, 1h (b) mov ah, 2h (c) mov ah, 2h (d) mov ah, 0h int 21h int 20h int 21h int 21h

Question 206. Which of the following will read a character into al:
(a) mov ah, 9h (b) mov ah, 2h (c) mov ah, 2h (d) mov ah, 1h int 21h int 20h int 21h int 21h

Question 207. Which of the following will display a string whose address is in the dx register:
(a) mov ah, 0h (b) mov ah, 2h (c) mov ah, 9h (d) mov ah, 9h int 21h int 20h int 21h int 22h

Question 208. Which of the following will terminate a program and return to MS-DOS:
(a) mov ax, 4c00h(b) mov ax, 4c00h (c) mov dx, 4c00h (d) mov ax, 9h int 20h int 21h int 21h int 22h

Question 209. The cmp instruction modifies the
(a) program counter (b) instruction register (c) flags register (d) segment register

Question 210. Conditional instructions typically inspect the
(a) program counter (b) instruction register (c) flags register (d) accumulator

Question 211. The bp register is typically used for accessing
(a) strings (b) memory (c) stack (d) data segment

Question 212. The ret instruction modifies the
(a) instruction register (b) program counter (c) address register (d) flags register

Question 213. The sp register is typically used for accessing
(a) strings (b) memory (c) stack (d) data segment

Question 214. The call instruction modifies
(a) the flags register (b) program counter (c) bp register (d) none of the previous

Question 215. The call instruction modifies
(a) the flags register (b) stack pointer (c) bp register (d) none of the previous

Question 216 The call instruction modifies
(a) the program counter and SP register (b) flags register (c) bp register (d) none of the previous

Question 217. The ret instruction modifies the
(a) stack pointer (b) bp register (c) instruction register (d) flags register

Question 218. One type of main memory in a PC is called
(a) SRAM (b) SDRAM (c) ROM (d) DROM