GET_CYCLECOUNT(9)					   BSD Kernel Developer's Manual					 GET_CYCLECOUNT(9)

NAME

     get_cyclecount -- get the CPU's fast counter register contents

SYNOPSIS

     #include <sys/param.h>
     #include <sys/systm.h>
     #include <machine/cpu.h>

     u_int64_t
     get_cyclecount(void);

DESCRIPTION

     The get_cyclecount() function uses a register available in most modern CPUs to return a value that is monotonically increasing inside each
     CPU.

     On SMP systems, there will be a number of separate monotonic sequences, one for each CPU running.	The value in the SMP case is selected from
     one of these sequences, dependent on which CPU was scheduled to service the request.

     The speed and the maximum value of each counter is CPU-dependent.	Some CPUs (such as the Intel 80486) do not have such a register, so
     get_cyclecount() on these platforms returns the number of nanoseconds represented by the structure returned by nanotime(9).

     The Pentium processors all use the TSC register.

     The Alpha processors use the PCC register.

     The IA64 processors use the AR.ITC register.

SEE ALSO

     nanotime(9)

HISTORY

     The get_cyclecount() function first appeared in FreeBSD 5.0.

AUTHORS

     This manual page was written by Mark Murray <markm@FreeBSD.org>.

BSD
								 November 20, 2000							       BSD