ITPEC IP October 2023 Question 19
Which of the following is an appropriate description concerning the OS for PCs?
Explanation
Some PC OSs can be started from external storage such as a CD-ROM or USB memory — booting is not tied to the hard disk.
A PC's firmware (BIOS or UEFI) can load the OS from any bootable device in its boot order. OS installation media, recovery discs and live systems such as Linux distributions that run from a USB memory without being installed all use this.
Answer (d)
Why not others:
- •(a) — one PC can hold several OSs and choose one at start-up (multi-boot), or run others in virtual machines
- •(b) — 64-bit OSs for 64-bit CPUs are standard, for example the 64-bit editions of Windows and Linux
- •(c) — OSs keep backward compatibility, so most software written for the old version still runs after an upgrade; only some may need an update
Key rule: The firmware loads the OS from whichever bootable device comes first in the boot order, so an OS can start from a hard disk, SSD, optical disc or USB memory.
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