At 10:03 AM 3/25/01 -0500, you wrote:
> >even with prime95 running 24/7 on my Windows2000 system, it seems to come up
> >with a FEW idle cycles. I figure its when prime95 gets paged out or
>
>How does idle time accrue *to a process*? Idle time is when the CPU is not
>executing any process.
On a Win32 system, the idle time is kept track of by the idle PROCESS (a
thread or task operating autonomously, for you *n*x types). It is by
hooking into and pseudo-taking over this process that Prime95 does its work.
Win32 tracks ALL processes by (I think) 32 different "priority" levels,
broken into two different tiers (with only five basic priority levels from
low, midium low, etc, to high). The Idle Process is but one more process
running next to the Kernel, GDI, and other messaging and system processes
as well as user applications.
It *will* get the occasional cycle, lest it never be accessed at all, even
when Prime95 is running.
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