xref: /freebsd/share/man/man4/hpet.4 (revision 0957b409)
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25.\" $FreeBSD$
26.\"
27.Dd September 14, 2010
28.Dt HPET 4
29.Os
30.Sh NAME
31.Nm hpet
32.Nd High Precision Event Timer driver
33.Sh SYNOPSIS
34To compile this driver into the kernel,
35place the following lines in your
36kernel configuration file:
37.Bd -ragged -offset indent
38.Cd "device acpi"
39.Ed
40.Pp
41The following tunables are settable from the
42.Xr loader 8 :
43.Bl -ohang
44.It Va hint.hpet. Ns Ar X Ns Va .allowed_irqs
45is a 32bit mask.
46Each set bit allows driver to use respective IRQ,
47if BIOS also set respective capability bit in comparator's configuration
48register.
49Default value is 0xffff0000, except some known broken hardware.
50.It Va hint.hpet. Ns Ar X Ns Va .clock
51controls event timers functionality support.
52Setting to 0, disables it.
53Default value is 1.
54.It Va hint.hpet. Ns Ar X Ns Va .legacy_route
55controls "LegacyReplacement Route" mode.
56If enabled, HPET will steal IRQ0 of i8254 timer and IRQ8 of RTC.
57Before using it, make sure that respective
58drivers are not using interrupts, by setting also:
59.Bd -literal
60hint.attimer.0.clock=0
61hint.atrtc.0.clock=0
62.Ed
63Default value is 0.
64.It Va hint.hpet. Ns Ar X Ns Va .per_cpu
65controls how much per-CPU event timers should driver attempt to register.
66This functionality requires every comparator in a group to have own unshared
67IRQ, so it depends on hardware capabilities and interrupts configuration.
68Default value is 1.
69.El
70.Sh DESCRIPTION
71This driver uses High Precision Event Timer hardware (part of the chipset,
72usually enumerated via ACPI) to supply kernel with one time counter and
73several (usually from 3 to 8) event timers.
74This hardware includes single main counter with known increment frequency
75(10MHz or more), and several programmable comparators (optionally with
76automatic reload feature).
77When value of the main counter matches current value of any comparator,
78interrupt can be generated.
79Depending on hardware capabilities and configuration, interrupt can be
80delivered as regular I/O APIC interrupt (ISA or PCI) in range from 0 to 31,
81or as Front Side Bus interrupt, alike to PCI MSI interrupts, or in so called
82"LegacyReplacement Route" HPET can steal IRQ0 of i8254 and IRQ8 of the RTC.
83Interrupt can be either edge- or level-triggered.
84In last case they could be safely shared with PCI IRQs.
85Driver prefers to use FSB interrupts, if supported, to avoid sharing.
86If it is not possible, it uses single sharable IRQ from PCI range.
87Other modes (LegacyReplacement and ISA IRQs) require special care to setup,
88but could be configured manually via device hints.
89.Pp
90Event timers provided by the driver support both one-shot an periodic modes
91and irrelevant to CPU power states.
92.Pp
93Depending on hardware capabilities and configuration, driver can expose each
94comparator as separate event timer or group them into one or several per-CPU
95event timers.
96In last case interrupt of every of those comparators within
97group is bound to specific CPU core.
98This is possible only when each of these comparators has own unsharable IRQ.
99.Sh SEE ALSO
100.Xr acpi 4 ,
101.Xr apic 4 ,
102.Xr atrtc 4 ,
103.Xr attimer 4 ,
104.Xr eventtimers 4 ,
105.Xr timecounters 4
106.Sh HISTORY
107The
108.Nm
109driver first appeared in
110.Fx 6.3 .
111Support for event timers was added in
112.Fx 9.0 .
113