Accessing raw CPUID information is actually very easy, here is a C++ class for that which works in Windows, Linux and OSX:

#ifndef CPUID_H
#define CPUID_H

#ifdef _WIN32
#include <limits.h>
#include <intrin.h>
typedef unsigned __int32  uint32_t;

#else
#include <stdint.h>
#endif

class CPUID {
  uint32_t regs[4];

public:
  explicit CPUID(unsigned i) {
#ifdef _WIN32
    __cpuid((int *)regs, (int)i);

#else
    asm volatile
      ("cpuid" : "=a" (regs[0]), "=b" (regs[1]), "=c" (regs[2]), "=d" (regs[3])
       : "a" (i), "c" (0));
    // ECX is set to zero for CPUID function 4
#endif
  }

  const uint32_t &EAX() const {return regs[0];}
  const uint32_t &EBX() const {return regs[1];}
  const uint32_t &ECX() const {return regs[2];}
  const uint32_t &EDX() const {return regs[3];}
};

#endif // CPUID_H

To use it just instantiate an instance of the class, load the CPUID instruction you are interested in and examine the registers. For example:

#include "CPUID.h"

#include <iostream>
#include <string>

using namespace std;

int main(int argc, char *argv[]) {
  CPUID cpuID(0); // Get CPU vendor

  string vendor;
  vendor += string((const char *)&cpuID.EBX(), 4);
  vendor += string((const char *)&cpuID.EDX(), 4);
  vendor += string((const char *)&cpuID.ECX(), 4);

  cout << "CPU vendor = " << vendor << endl;

  return 0;
}

This Wikipedia page tells you how to use CPUID: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CPUID

EDIT: Added #include <intrin.h> for Windows, per comments.