Probability and Random Processes (ECEg-2110)

Work sheet-I

1. If and are mutually exclusive events & find

2. Show that the probability that exactly one of the events or occurs is given by:

3. Events A and B are mutually exclusive. Can they also be independent? Explain

4. Let What is if:

(a) A and B are independent?

(b) A and B are mutually exclusive?

5. Show that

6. A problem is given to three students and whose chances of solving it are

and respectively. What is the probability that

a. only one of them solves the problem

b. at least two of them solves the problem

c. the problem is solved

7. The university buys workstations from two different suppliers, Mini Micros (MM)

and Highest Technology (HT). On delivery, 10% of MM’s workstations are defective,

while 20% of HT’s workstations are defective. The university buys 140 MM

workstations and 60 HT workstations for its computer lab. Suppose you walk into

the computer lab and randomly sit down at a workstation.

(a) What is the probability that your workstation is from MM? From HT?

(b) What is the probability that your workstation is defective? Answer: 0.13.

(c) Given that your workstation is defective, what is the probability that it came from

Mini Micros? Answer: 7/13.

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8. The probability that a cell in a wireless system is overloaded is 1/3. Given that it is

overloaded, the probability of a blocked call is 0.3. Given that it is not overloaded,

the probability of a blocked call is 0.1. Find the conditional probability that the

system is overloaded given that your call is blocked. Answer: 0.6.

9. Professor Random has taught probability for many years. She has found that 80%

of students who do the homework pass the exam, while 10% of students who don’t

do the homework pass the exam. If 60% of the students do the homework, what

percent of students pass the exam? Of students who pass the exam, what percent

did the homework? Answer: 12/13.

10.A certain jet aircraft’s autopilot has conditional probability 1/3 of failure given that

it employs a faulty microprocessor chip. The autopilot has conditional probability

1/10 of failure given that it employs a nonfaulty chip. According to the chip

manufacturer, the probability of a customer’s receiving a faulty chip is 1/4. Given

that an autopilot failure has occurred, find the conditional probability that a faulty

chip was used. Answer: 10/19.

11.You and your neighbor attempt to use your cordless phones at the same time. Your

phones independently select one of ten channels at random to connect to the base

unit. What is the probability that both phones pick the same channel?

12.An electronics store carries three brands of computers, five brands of flat screens,

and seven brands of printers. How many different systems (computer, flat screen,

and printer) can the store sell?

13.A faulty computer memory location reads out random 8-bit bytes. What is the

probability that a random word has four ones and four zeros? Answer: 0.2734.

14.For the series and parallel arrangements of system components, determine

reliabilities of the systems described by the block diagrams as follows.
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 (a) The diagram in Figure 1.1. (a)
(b) The diagram in Figure 1.1. (b)

Figure 1.1 (a)

Figure 1.1 (b)

15.A satellite can fail for many possible reasons, two of which are computer failure and

engine failure. For a given mission, it is known that:

The probability of engine failure is 0.008.

The probability of computer failure is 0.001.
Given engine failure, the probability of satellite failure is 0.98.
Given computer failure, the probability of satellite failure is 0.45.
Given any other component failure, the probability of satellite failure is zero.

(a) Determine the probability that a satellite fails.

(b) Determine the probability that a satellite fails and is due to engine failure.
(c) Assume that engines in different satellites perform independently. Given a
satellite has failed as a result of engine failure, what is the probability that the same
will happen to another satellite?

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16.A quality control record panel of transistors gives the results shown in Table 2.4
when classified by manufacturer and quality.

Let one transistor be selected at random. What is the probability of it being:

(a) From manufacturer A and with acceptable quality?
(b) Acceptable given that it is from manufacturer C?
(c) From manufacturer B given that it is marginal?

Table 1 Quality control results, for Problem 16

17.The relay network shown in Fig. 2 operates if and only if there is a closed path of
relays from left to right. Assume that relays fail independently and that the
probability of failure of each relay is as shown.
What is the probability that the relay network operates? Ans: 0.865

Fig. 2 Fig 3

18.Consider the switching networks shown in Fig. 1-5. Let A1, A2, and A3, denote the
events that the switches S1, S2, and S3 are closed, respectively. Let Aab denote the
event that there is a closed path between terminals a and b. Express Aab in terms of
A1, A2, and A3, for each of the networks shown in Fig 3 above.

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