Data storage and compression: past paper questions

Where the questions come from

• Question 1May/June 2026, paper 11Structured3 marks

  Data storage can be measured in different units. Tick (✓) one box to show which is the largest unit of measurement for data storage.

  Try this question
• Question 2Oct/Nov 2025, paper 11Structured12 marks

  An employee of a company sells houses. He sends images of the houses to his company. The employee compresses the image files using lossy compression before sending them.

  Try this question
• Question 1Oct/Nov 2024, paper 11Structured6 marks

  The size of a file can be measured using different units. Tick (✓) one box to show which of these is not a unit of measurement for a file.

  Try this question
• Question 5Oct/Nov 2023, paper 11Structured14 marks

  A musician is recording herself playing the music for a song on the piano. Explain how the analogue sound is recorded and converted to digital.

  Try this question
• Question 8May/June 2026, paper 11Structured10 marks

  A student opens a document on their computer and inputs text. Explain how the computer represents the text.

  Try this question
• Question 3Oct/Nov 2025, paper 11Structured11 marks

  A student has a portable device. He uses an on-screen keyboard to write messages to his friend.

  Try this question
• Question 2Oct/Nov 2024, paper 12Structured7 marks

  Data storage can be measured using different units of measurement. Identify the name of the smallest unit of measurement of data.

  Try this question
• Question 5Oct/Nov 2023, paper 12Structured5 marks

  A band is recording their new song. They need to consider the sample rate and sample resolution of their recording. Give one benefit of using a higher sample rate to record the song.

  Try this question
• Question 5Oct/Nov 2025, paper 13Structured7 marks

  Text, images and sound are represented as binary to be processed by a computer. Complete the table by writing the missing terms and descriptions about representing text, images and sound as binary.

  Try this question
• Question 1Oct/Nov 2024, paper 13Structured15 marks

  Data can be measured using different units of storage. Tick (✓) one box to show which of the following is the largest unit of data storage.

  Try this question
• Question 1Oct/Nov 2023, paper 13Structured8 marks

  A mobile telephone has built-in input and output devices. Give two examples of an input device that would be built into a mobile telephone.

  Try this question
• Question 1May/June 2025, paper 11Structured4 marks

  The size of a file can be measured using different data storage units. Tick (✓) one box to show the smallest data storage unit.

  Try this question
• Question 2Oct/Nov 2024, paper 13Structured24 marks

  An employee has a report that they need to email to their employer. The employee compresses the report file before emailing it. State the effect the compression has on the report file.

  Try this question
• Question 7Oct/Nov 2023, paper 13Structured6 marks

  A photographer takes an image with a digital camera. The photographer sets the resolution and colour depth for the image. State what is meant by the image resolution.

  Try this question
• Question 3May/June 2024, paper 11Structured5 marks

  The binary number 10100011 is stored in random access memory (RAM). A logical left shift of three places is performed on the binary number. Give the 8-bit binary number that will be stored after the shift has taken place.

  Try this question
• Question 2May/June 2023, paper 11Structured10 marks

  A student has a sound file that is too large to be stored on their external secondary storage device. The student compresses the sound file to make the file size smaller. The compression method used reduces the sample rate and the sample resolution of the sound file.

  Try this question
• Question 1May/June 2024, paper 12Structured6 marks

  Data can be measured in bits. Give the name of the data storage measurement that is equal to 8 bits.

  Try this question
• Question 3May/June 2023, paper 12Structured10 marks

  When keys are pressed on a keyboard, the text is converted to binary to be processed by the computer. Describe how the text is converted to binary to be processed by the computer.

  Try this question
• Question 1May/June 2024, paper 13Structured3 marks

  The size of a file can be measured in different units. State how many bits there are in a byte.

  Try this question
• Question 2May/June 2024, paper 13Structured2 marks

  An image has a 16-bit colour depth and a resolution of 1000 × 1750 pixels. State what is meant by a 16-bit colour depth.

  Try this question