CPU Designations

[Will Mc Donald]

286, 386 and 486 are, well, kinda what they say. Intel didn't start giving processors names until Pentium. Something to do with them no being able to copyright numbers as I recall.

The original Pentium and Pentium MMX CPUs are i586. As are AMD K6 and K6-2/3 and so on.

Pretty much everything from the Pentium II onwards (not counting x86 64bit CPUs, I have no idea what they'd be designated) is classed as i686. PII, PIII, P4, AMD K7 (Athlon, Thunderbird etc.) and so on.

If I remember correctly, the x86 designation is the instruction set the processor is compatable with. With higher generations generally being able to execute code compiled for previous generations? 

Will.


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Krautkramer, John" <John.Krautkramer at Micrel.Com>
To: <redhat-list at redhat.com>
Sent: Wednesday, March 17, 2004 3:26 PM
Subject: CPU Designations


> Hi,
> 
> I realize this is a very basic question but here goes...
> 
> What are the CPU designations expressed by:
> 
>     i286, i386, i486, i586, i686, etc.
> 
> I assume the first 2 are Pentium II and Pentium III respectively. What specifically are the others? I have the latest  Pentium 4 with hyperthreading. What is that CPU in this naming scheme?
> 
> Thanks in advance!
> 
> John
> 
> 
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