The term cycle stealing is used in context of:
2020
The term cycle stealing is used in context of:
- A.
Interrupt based data transfer
- B.
Polling Mode Data Transfer
- C.
DMA based data Transfer
- D.
Clock cycle overriding
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Correct answer: C
Cycle Stealing is a method used in Direct Memory Access (DMA) data transfer. In this mode, the DMA controller "steals" or borrows a bus cycle from the CPU to transfer a single word of data.
Since the CPU and DMA controller share the same system bus, the DMA controller requests the CPU to pause its bus activity for one clock cycle.
The CPU suspends its operation for that specific cycle, allowing the DMA to transfer data directly between the I/O device and memory.
This is highly efficient because the CPU doesn't stop entirely; it just slows down slightly while data is transferred in the background.