how does TOP work with 2 CPUs

ipanema · 10-22-2007, 02:03 AM

Does TOP command collect details of process on both cpus, when there are 2 CPUs present on the machine ?

Then when it says 50% idel , does it say for two CPUs together or only one.

I did read about some options like toggling etc, but those commands are not supported in my version.

My TOP says Version 3.6.

Is there any other TOP flavors / versions i should be using to get proper results on 2 CPU machines?

Thanks In advance

brianmcgee · 10-22-2007, 03:15 AM

You could display it as a total or seperate for each cpu by pressing the key "1":

Code:

# top
top - 10:14:02 up 16 days, 19:51,  1 user,  load average: 1.33, 2.39, 2.27
Tasks: 188 total,   1 running, 187 sleeping,   0 stopped,   0 zombie
Cpu0  :  0.7% us,  0.3% sy,  0.0% ni, 98.7% id,  0.3% wa,  0.0% hi,  0.0% si
Cpu1  :  0.0% us,  0.0% sy,  0.0% ni, 100.0% id,  0.0% wa,  0.0% hi,  0.0% si
Cpu2  :  0.0% us,  0.0% sy,  0.0% ni, 100.0% id,  0.0% wa,  0.0% hi,  0.0% si
Cpu3  :  2.3% us,  0.7% sy,  0.0% ni, 96.4% id,  0.3% wa,  0.3% hi,  0.0% si
Mem:   6228476k total,  3032896k used,  3195580k free,    39864k buffers
Swap: 12582904k total,        0k used, 12582904k free,   344936k cached

Code:

# top -v
top: procps version 3.2.3
usage:  top -hv | -bcisS -d delay -n iterations [-u user | -U user] -p pid [,pid ...]

ipanema · 10-22-2007, 04:21 AM

That option is not available (pressing 1) on my version of Top it 3.6.

Any other ideas? or is it that 3.6 version of Top shows only total process not cpu wise?

can anyone confirm?

ghostdancer · 10-22-2007, 05:21 AM

Can you confirm the version is 3.6? Because it is rather weird you have version 3.6, when latest version is 3.2.7 ( http://procps.sourceforge.net/ ).

kromberg · 10-22-2007, 03:09 PM

Type in 'o' and then 'J'. What will show what cpu the program is current executing on.

Keith

ipanema · 10-23-2007, 12:29 AM

Yes I my top says its 3.6 only.

By the way I'm using Solaris 9.

bash-2.05$ top -v
top: version 3.6

About the options J and o. option 'o' asking for sorting order and 'J' is not available.

ipanema · 10-23-2007, 01:01 AM

The top I'm using was taken from
http://sourceforge.net/projects/unixtop

their FAQ says
. Does top really support multi-processor systems?

On platforms that support multiple processors, top is able to detect
and correctly summarize the information about those processors. What
top does not do is break down the cpu states summary (the third line
of the display) by cpu. Instead it collects the cpu state information
from all processors and combines them in to a single line. Some
vendors include a modified version of top that presents this
information for each cpu. Top 3.7 may have this functionality but it
is not present in the standard top 3.6 release.

So the search ends here