010-160 Hardware and Operating Systems 5 — Questions and Answers
Question 1: What is the purpose of the lsmod command?
- List available but unloaded kernel modules
- Display currently loaded kernel modules (Correct answer)
- Load a specific kernel module
- Show module dependency tree
Correct answer: Display currently loaded kernel modules
lsmod shows the status of all currently loaded kernel modules, including their size and usage count.
Question 2: Which hardware component determines the maximum speed at which data can be transferred between the CPU and RAM?
- The GPU clock speed
- The memory bus speed and RAM type (Correct answer)
- The hard drive RPM
- The network interface card speed
Correct answer: The memory bus speed and RAM type
The memory bus speed and RAM type (e.g., DDR4-3200) determine the maximum bandwidth available between the CPU and system memory.
Question 3: In Linux, what type of file is /dev/sda?
- A regular text file containing disk information
- A block device file representing a storage device (Correct answer)
- A symbolic link to the disk partition table
- A configuration file for the SCSI driver
Correct answer: A block device file representing a storage device
/dev/sda is a block device file that represents the first SCSI/SATA disk; the kernel uses it to communicate with the storage device.
Question 4: What is the purpose of cache memory (L1, L2, L3) in a CPU?
- Store the operating system kernel for fast access
- Buffer disk writes before flushing to storage
- Store frequently accessed data closer to the CPU to reduce latency (Correct answer)
- Provide additional RAM when system memory is full
Correct answer: Store frequently accessed data closer to the CPU to reduce latency
CPU cache levels (L1, L2, L3) store frequently used data and instructions near the processor to avoid slower main memory accesses.
Question 5: Which file would you read to find the Linux kernel version currently running on a system?
- /etc/kernel-version
- /proc/version (Correct answer)
- /boot/kernel.conf
- /sys/kernel/release
Correct answer: /proc/version
/proc/version contains the kernel version string, build date, and compiler information for the running kernel.
Question 6: What is the typical role of the /sys filesystem (sysfs) in Linux?
- Store system-wide configuration files
- Provide a virtual filesystem exposing kernel objects and device attributes (Correct answer)
- Mount external file systems automatically
- Log kernel error messages to disk
Correct answer: Provide a virtual filesystem exposing kernel objects and device attributes
sysfs is a virtual filesystem mounted at /sys that exports kernel objects, their attributes, and their relationships to user space.
Question 7: Which hardware interface standard is commonly used to connect modern internal SSDs at very high speeds?
- PATA (IDE)
- SATA II
- NVMe over PCIe (Correct answer)
- USB 3.0
Correct answer: NVMe over PCIe
NVMe (Non-Volatile Memory Express) over PCIe provides very high throughput and low latency for SSDs, far exceeding SATA speeds.
010-160 Hardware and Operating Systems 5
What is the purpose of the lsmod command?