Sleeping in real-mode

[evoex]

Hello everybody,

I'm working on a boot sector, related to the "512 byte challenge" as posted here: http://forum.osdev.org/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=25492

For that I wondered if I could code snake in 512 bytes, so I went ahead to work on that. But now I need to sleep for some interval. I found an interrupt providing a timer that ticks at approximately 18.2 Hz, but I need something more accurate. Is there any way provided by the BIOS to sleep, or to retrieve the approximate time in milliseconds?
Worst case I'll run the same instruction(s) for a larger number of times, but I'd rather have a better solution.

Any ideas?


Thanks in advance

[linguofreak]

The PIT can be reprogrammed to generate interrupts at higher frequencies than 18 Hz (in fact, 18 Hz is its lowest frequency).

You can find more information on this by searching the Wiki for "PIT".

[evoex]

Perfect, thank you!

[XanClic]

Since you are most probably looking for something consuming as little space as possible, I guess you might be interested in the BIOS wait call (theoretically providing microsecond resolution): http://www.ctyme.com/intr/rb-1525.htm

[evoex]

Since you are most probably looking for something consuming as little space as possible, I guess you might be interested in the BIOS wait call (theoretically providing microsecond resolution): http://www.ctyme.com/intr/rb-1525.htm

Even easier! Thank you, both!