diff --git a/src/ior.c b/src/ior.c
index b7db09c..c724664 100644
--- a/src/ior.c
+++ b/src/ior.c
@@ -449,46 +449,63 @@ static int CountErrors(IOR_param_t * test, int access, int errors)
 }
 
 /*
- * Compares hostnames to determine the number of tasks per node
+ * Count the number of tasks that share a host.
+ *
+ * This function employees the gethostname() call, rather than using
+ * MPI_Get_processor_name().  We are interested in knowing the number
+ * of tasks that share a file system client (I/O node, compute node,
+ * whatever that may be).  However on machines like BlueGene/Q,
+ * MPI_Get_processor_name() uniquely identifies a cpu in a compute node,
+ * not the node where the I/O is function shipped to.  gethostname()
+ * is assumed to identify the shared filesystem client in more situations.
+ *
+ * NOTE: This also assumes that the task count on all nodes is equal
+ * to the task count on the host running MPI task 0.
  */
 static int CountTasksPerNode(int numTasks, MPI_Comm comm)
 {
-        char localhost[MAX_STR], hostname[MAX_STR], taskOnNode[MAX_STR];
-        int count = 1, resultsLen = MAX_STR, i;
+        char localhost[MAX_STR];
+        char hostname0[MAX_STR];
         static int firstPass = TRUE;
-        MPI_Status status;
-
-        MPI_CHECK(MPI_Get_processor_name(localhost, &resultsLen),
-                  "cannot get processor name");
+        unsigned count;
+        unsigned flag;
+        int rc;
 
         if (verbose >= VERBOSE_2 && firstPass) {
-                sprintf(taskOnNode, "task %d on %s", rank, localhost);
-                OutputToRoot(numTasks, comm, taskOnNode);
+                char tmp[MAX_STR];
+                sprintf(tmp, "task %d on %s", rank, localhost);
+                OutputToRoot(numTasks, comm, tmp);
                 firstPass = FALSE;
         }
 
-        if (numTasks > 1) {
-                if (rank == 0) {
-                        /* MPI_receive all hostnames, and compare to local hostname */
-                        for (i = 0; i < numTasks - 1; i++) {
-                                MPI_CHECK(MPI_Recv
-                                          (hostname, MAX_STR, MPI_CHAR,
-                                           MPI_ANY_SOURCE, MPI_ANY_TAG, comm,
-                                           &status),
-                                          "cannot receive hostnames");
-                                if (strcmp(hostname, localhost) == 0)
-                                        count++;
-                        }
-                } else {
-                        /* MPI_send hostname to root node */
-                        MPI_CHECK(MPI_Send(localhost, MAX_STR, MPI_CHAR, 0, 0,
-                                           comm), "cannot send hostname");
-                }
-                MPI_CHECK(MPI_Bcast(&count, 1, MPI_INT, 0, comm),
-                          "cannot broadcast tasks-per-node value");
+        rc = gethostname(localhost, MAX_STR);
+        if (rc == -1) {
+                /* This node won't match task 0's hostname...expect in the
+                   case where ALL gethostname() calls fail, in which
+                   case ALL nodes will appear to be on the same node.
+                   We'll handle that later. */
+                localhost[0] = '\0';
+                if (rank == 0)
+                        perror("gethostname() failed");
         }
 
-        return (count);
+        /* send task 0's hostname to all tasks */
+        if (rank == 0)
+                strcpy(hostname0, localhost);
+        MPI_CHECK(MPI_Bcast(hostname0, MAX_STR, MPI_CHAR, 0, comm),
+                  "broadcast of task 0's hostname failed");
+        if (strcmp(hostname0, localhost) == 0)
+                flag = 1;
+        else
+                flag = 0;
+
+        /* count the tasks share the same host as task 0 */
+        MPI_Allreduce(&flag, &count, 1, MPI_UNSIGNED, MPI_SUM, comm);
+
+        if (hostname0[0] == '\0')
+                count = 1;
+
+        return (int)count;
 }
 
 /*