Tata Placement Paper : Bangalore Institute Of Technology ,28 January 2011
Written round:
1. Verbal is very easy. The first 15 questions can be answered in about 30 seconds each. This is followed by two passages with 5 questions each (approx). I noticed the SECOND passage is shorter and easier to handle in many papers so i went for this first - it worked for me. The first passage was longer and harder to understand because it had lots of detail
2. Apti was simple enough. Remenber DO NOT SPEND TOO MUCH TIME ON THINGS YOU DONT KNOW. Its easy to get carried away. If you dont know the answer mark "C" - this is the safest bet based on reliable sources.
3. The tech section - Electronics was filled with BASICS only. Nothing out of the world but since electronics is a vast domain even simple questions can seem strange. Here is what i did:
a. Went through OpAmps - Basics properties , Basic circuits- inv amp, non-inv amp, anv and non-inv summer, difference amp, log, antilog, differentiator, integrator, schmidt trigger. Understand the diagram and working. This study was helpful as qone question was from Opamp and my understanding helped me solve it. Dont break your head over derivations and stuff.
b. ADC, DAC types, resolution, advantages, number of components (comparator etc). Again understand the diagram and working. This is important so please do not skip.
c. Basics of digital electronics : Gates, simplification, sequential components, mux, demux, encoder, decoder etc. Just make sure you know what each does, how it works, truth table. We had few questions from simplification.
d. Microprocessors : I learnt the bare basics of 8085 and 8086 but it didnt help me in the test. The questions were from interrupts but they were answerable.
e. C - two questions were from C. The images of stars and planets swarmed my thoughts (im bad at C). Since questions were from C i marked C as answer . Haha.
f. DSP: I learnt basics such as why dsp, why DFT, why FFT, simple problems. No dsp question was present in the written test.
The above topics will help you a lot in the tech interview as well.
I was very lucky - I was shortlisted for direct HR interview so escaped the technical round.
The HR was very sweet and straigntforward. She asked me to read a passage (from a sheet) aloud. I was stopped abruptly and asked to summarize. I was asked about hobbies and stuff.
Remember - Do not words like DONT KNOW, I,M BAD AT THIS etc. Avoid negative sentances and words. Mask them with - I NEED TO IMPROVE, THIS AREA HAS SCOPE FOR DEVELOPMENT etc. Practice a positive attitude for a fey days before placments. Thing positively and avoid speaking negatively - this always helps!
Prepare for two Strengths and Weakness. Remember when you are asked for strengths the HR is thinking - "why should i hire this person?" and when asked weakness the HR thinks "why should i reject this person". So use weakness which will not eliminate you as a candidate.
Most Important:
If you are not selected please do not get disheartened - IT IS NOT THE END OF THE WORLD. I have an aggr of 85% and was rejected by the TCS HR though i have good communication skills. Its just luck or absense of it sometimes which decides your selecton/rejection. Dont be hard on yourself, get over it soon, think as to what went wrong and prepare for the next company.