High precision timing within Microsoft Windows: threads, scheduling and system interrupts

The operation of a real-time task under Microsoft's Windows 98 Operating Sy stem was investigated. The uniformity of the frame rate achieved in an anim ation program was measured to assess its suitability a visual stimulus in a physiology experiment. Much better performance is obtained when timing of the animation is controlled by the thread scheduler of the operating system , rather than using the hardware timing which is more traditionally used. ( C) 2001 Published by Elsevier Science B.V.