[jiggawatts]

Basically the same as any other OS, but typically stripped down to the bare essentials. The key differentiator is the kernel scheduler, which is typically set up to provide regular and guaranteed time slices to processes.

Normal operating systems provide time slices in big chunks, and not very predictably.

The RTOS approach is less efficient overall and has lower total throughput, but some applications don’t need a lot of horsepower, just consistency.

Think: robotics, audio, servo motor controllers, etc…