40-bit PMC counters, can they be used for marking start/stops

[halivingston]

FIXED_CTR0 has instructions retired being counted. If the counter is only 40-bit (pre-Nehalem), is there a use of this counter without sampling?

To paraphrase, if all I'm doing is RDPMC on a certain code site, and then RDPMC on another code site, this is bound to overflow right?

Or does that not matter if I always subtract the two numbers and multiply it by negative 1?

[Bernard]

Try to consultIntel Manuals.

[Patrick_F_Intel1 · Accepted solution]

Hello halivingston,
There is always the danger of overflowing the counters if they are used in the free-running mode (or sometimes called 'counting mode').
We can estimate how long before the counter will wrap:

Max instructions/sec @ 5 inst/cycle= frequency * 5 inst/cycle
Just for ease of computing say the freq is 2 Ghz then we could get 10 billion (1.0e10)instructions/sec.
A 40 bit counter can count 1,099,511,627,775 (or ~1.1e12) before wrapping.
So, at this example 2GHz frequency and 5 instructions/cycle, we could run about 100 seconds before wrapping.

Of course, some CPUs have a higher frequency but many codes probably don't sustain retiring 5 instructions/cycle.
So... depending on these factors, the wrap around may be longer.
Pat

[petminuti]

Isn't there a better answer I am more precise?

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[Patrick_F_Intel1]

In what way would you like the answer to be more precise?