Note : Question one is compulsory. Answer any three from
the rest.
1. (a) Compare and contrast the characteristics of
control flow versus Data flow computers.
(b) What is meant by Superscalar processors? Explain
the concept of pipelining in superscalar processors.
(c) What is meant by m-way memory interleaving? Describe
the C-access memory scheme.
(d) What is the Cache coherence problem? What are the
Cache inconsistencies resulting from it? Give a solution
to this problem.
(e) What are the issues relating to Multithreading?
What are the solutions to these issues?
(f) Write a short note on the language feature needed
for parallelism.
2. Describe the following terms in the context of computer
architecture:
(i) Systolic arrays
(ii) Hypercube
(iii) Omega Network
(iv) Scalability
(v) Scalability Matrix
3. (a) What is VLIW architecture? Explain pipelining
in VLIW processors.
(b) Compare and contrast Central Arbitration with Distributed
Arbitration.
(c) What is the purpose of prefetch buffers in instruction
pipelining?
4. (a) What is multivector computing? What are the
various types of vector instructions? Discuss the S-Access
memory organisation for vector processors.
(b) Differentiate between static versus dynamic dataflow
computers.
5. Describe the following terms in the context of computer
architecture and parallel programming:
(i) Microtasking in Cray Multiprocessor
(ii) Auto tasking in Cray Multiprocessors
(iii) Monitors
(iv) Asynchronous message passing
(v) Multicomputers
6. Write short notes on the following:
(i) Multitasking bottlenecks in conventional UNIX
(ii) Multithreaded UNIX kernel
(iii) Minisupercomputers
(iv) Locality of references
(v) Translation Look aside buffer
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