i686 ---> i586, i386 ---> i586, x86_64 stays the same
psmith
johnsmithdoe14 at googlemail.com
Mon Apr 6 10:30:47 UTC 2009
Will Woods wrote:
> On Sun, 2009-04-05 at 23:01 +0100, psmith wrote:
>
>
>> i completely understand the reasoning to move i365 up to i586, but why
>> on earth restrict i686 capable processors to the i586 instruction sets?
>>
>
> Again: the only difference between i586 and i686 is the CMOV family of
> instructions, which are generally *slower* than the i586 version.
>
> You can read Linus' detailed explanation here:
> http://ondioline.org/mail/cmov-a-bad-idea-on-out-of-order-cpus
>
> Building for i686 gives *no* real performance benefit[1], but breaks
> support for i586 machines - Via C7-based netbooks, AMD Geode (e.g. the
> OLPC XO-1), and so on.
>
> -w
>
> [1] except on in-order CPUs like Atom and the original Pentium
>
>
well i understand why fedora stuck with downgrading to i586 now, saving
work by only having to compile 1 kernel version for the x86 arch (plus
to keep the olpc folks happy i suppose) and while linus is undoubtably a
clever guy i think intel know their arch better than anyone, and if cmov
was a performance hit it would be removed ;) looks like i'll need to
compile my own i686 for my aspire one as the i586 kernel in F11 beta is
showing a noticeable performance hit over F10 i686 :(
phil
More information about the fedora-test-list
mailing list