On Sat, 2003-09-06 at 17:49, John Kodis wrote: > On Sat, Sep 06, 2003 at 02:02:56PM -0400, Chris Kloiber wrote: > > ... a lot of stuff that I agree with, but can't resist adding a few > additional comments. > > > The common arches are: > > > > i386 The 80386 cpu, a least common denominator of sorts. All of the > > higher numbered common processors include the i386 instruction set. > > Most rpm packages are "i386". > > > > i486 Almost nobody makes rpms tuned for this chip, it was a short lived > > stepping stone to the Pentium. > > The other significant difference is that an i386 will generally lack a > floating point unit, which is one reason why there are few if any > floating-point operations in the base Linux kernel. Floating point > arithmatic on an i386 requires either an external FPU chip, or trap > handlers to emulate the floating point instructions in software. > > I tend to think of the i486 as an i386 with a built-in FPU. If there > are any other major differences I can't remember what they are. I forgot about that. > > ia64 The Intel 64 bit processors, called Itanium. > > Sometimes also derisively called the Itanic. Allright, I *wanted* to say that, but thought I'd try to be nice. > > They can run some programs make for i386 and up, but *slowly*. > > Are you sure about this? I thought that the ia64 was a completely > different architecture than the ia32, with no backward compatability. It was in the first Itamium processors, Look at the kernel config help text for CONFIG_IA32_SUPPORT Also found this on Google: http://www.fool.com/portfolios/rulemaker/2000/rulemaker000225.htm > > amd64 Also temporarily known as "x86_64". These are the new AMD > > Opterons, and soon the "Athlon 64" > > Noteworthy because these are 64-bit CPUs with full backward > compatibility with the ia32 architecture. The reports I've seen also > indicate that the amd64 CPUs can run ia32 binaries faster than the > fastest current ia32 processors. It looks like AMD has a real winner > on their hands with this series of CPUs. I hope so, I want my next machine to be an amd64. :) -- Chris Kloiber -- Shrike-list mailing list Shrike-list@xxxxxxxxxx https://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/shrike-list
