- called 1024 times per second for periodic and alarm functions - decrements a DWORD counter by 976æ sec (1/1024) - when DWORD reaches zero, bit 7 of designated wait flag is set - if alarm was enabled by INT 1A,6, INT 4A is called when counter reaches zero to activate alarm handler - not available in model 30 PS/2 - see INT 15,83 INT 15,86