How to get system cpu/ram usage in c++ on Windows

c++ windows cpu ram
popgalop picture popgalop · Nov 4, 2012 · Viewed 10.5k times · Source

I once had the task of determining the following performance parameters from inside a running application:

  • Total virtual memory available
  • Virtual memory currently used
  • Virtual memory currently used by my process
  • Total RAM available
  • RAM currently used
  • RAM currently used by my process
  • % CPU currently used
  • % CPU currently used by my process

The code had to run on Windows and Linux. Even though this seems to be a standard task, finding the necessary information in the manuals (WIN32 API, GNU docs) as well as on the Internet took me several days, because there's so much incomplete/incorrect/outdated information on this topic to be found out there.

In order to save others from going through the same trouble, I thought it would be a good idea to collect all the scattered information plus what I found by trial and error here in one place.

Answer

Related questions

Get CPU Temperature

I want to get the CPU temperature. Below is what I've done using C++ and WMI. I'm reading MSAcpi_ThermalZoneTemperature, but it's always the same and it's not the CPU temperature at all. Is there any way to get the …

Read More
How to programmatically get the CPU cache page size in C++?

I'd like my program to read the cache line size of the CPU it's running on in C++. I know that this can't be done portably, so I will need a solution for Linux and another for Windows (Solutions for …

Read More
Best C++ IDE or Editor for Windows

What is the best C++ IDE or editor for using on Windows? I use Notepad++, but am missing IntelliSense from Visual Studio.

Read More