<sect1><title>x86info</title>
<sect2><title>Definition</title>
<para>
x86info is an application maintained by <emphasis>Dave Jones</emphasis> to identify <emphasis>CPU</emphasis>s fitted to a system.
</para>

<para>
To quote the README file...
</para>

<programlisting>
Somewhere in the mists of time, there was a program by Phil Karn (KA9Q)
called <emphasis>cpuid</emphasis>, which identified CPU. It didn't get updated very often,
and quickly got out of date. It also didn't do much more than just
simple decoding.

x86info was written to succeed Phils work. Initially, it borrowed some bits
from his code, but the last remnants are now long gone. Additional functionality
has been added, such as support for <emphasis>SMP</emphasis>, and building on non-Linux platforms.

For problems specific to the <emphasis>Cygwin</emphasis>/<emphasis>Win32</emphasis> port, contact
Matthew Gregan &lt;mgregan@jade.co.nz&gt;.


Features:
 - <emphasis>SMP</emphasis> support.
 - Recognition of all <emphasis>Intel</emphasis>/<emphasis>AMD</emphasis>/<emphasis>IDT</emphasis>/<emphasis>Cyrix</emphasis>/<emphasis>VIA</emphasis> <emphasis>CPU</emphasis>s.
 - Parsing of model specific <emphasis>registers</emphasis>.
 - Approximation of current <emphasis>CPU</emphasis> MHz.


Caveats:
*  For usage of the <emphasis>MSR</emphasis> / <emphasis>SMP</emphasis> functions, x86info needs the
   x86 cpuid driver provided with the Linux <emphasis>kernel</emphasis> 2.2.18 / 2.4.0,
   and the appropriate nodes in /dev

   To set up these devices, do the following..

        mkdir /dev/cpu
        for i in 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
        do
                mkdir /dev/cpu/$i ; cd /dev/cpu/$i
                mknod cpuid c 203 $i
                mknod msr c 202 $i
        done

*  If you are using the <emphasis>cpuid</emphasis> / <emphasis>msr</emphasis> drivers built as modules
   as opposed to built into the kernel, then you should ensure
   the following is in your /etc/modules.conf

        alias <emphasis>char-major-202</emphasis> <emphasis>msr</emphasis>  
        alias <emphasis>char-major-203</emphasis> <emphasis>cpuid</emphasis>

*  To build under <emphasis>Win32</emphasis>/<emphasis>Cygwin</emphasis>, uncomment the second line
   in the Makefile, otherwise some files will fail to build.

*  Usage under <emphasis>Win32</emphasis> is somewhat limited at present:
        - no support for reading <emphasis>MSR</emphasis>s (anyone want to write a driver?)

*  <emphasis>FreeBSD</emphasis> / <emphasis>OpenBSD</emphasis> / <emphasis>NetBSD</emphasis> also have the same limitations.

Info on the command line switches can be found in the man page.
</programlisting>
</sect2>

<sect2><title>References</title>
<itemizedlist>
<listitem><para>Homepage: http://www.codemonkey.org.uk</para></listitem>
</itemizedlist>
</sect2>

<sect2><title>See also</title>
<itemizedlist>
<listitem><para><emphasis>cpuid</emphasis></para></listitem>
</itemizedlist>
</sect2>

<sect2><title>Entry history</title>
<itemizedlist>
<listitem><para>Entry created: Tue Mar 18 20:02:15 EST 2003</para></listitem>
<listitem><para>Entry owner: <emphasis>Michael Still</emphasis> (mikal@stillhq.com)</para></listitem>
<listitem><para>Status: Unfinalized</para></listitem>
</itemizedlist>
</sect1>