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Hardware performance counter
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<p>In <a href="/facts/Computer/SQe1aK05">computers</a>, hardware performance counters (HPCs), or hardware counters are a set of special-purpose <a href="/facts/Processor_register/32RvbUdz">registers</a> built into modern <a href="/facts/Microprocessor/Fx9CaQht">microprocessors</a> to store the counts of hardware-related activities. Advanced users often rely on those counters to conduct low-level <a href="/facts/Profiling_(computer_programming)/JbSlDHPP">performance analysis</a> or <a href="/facts/Performance_tuning/SRkRTmVr">tuning</a>. </p>