From owner-freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.ORG Tue Apr 2 02:12:12 2013 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:1900:2254:206a::19:1]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 706C3472; Tue, 2 Apr 2013 02:12:12 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from lists@rewt.org.uk) Received: from abby.lhr1.as41113.net (hosted.mx.as41113.net [91.208.177.22]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 3B790DAD; Tue, 2 Apr 2013 02:12:11 +0000 (UTC) Received: from [172.16.9.23] (bella.stf.rewt.org.uk [91.208.177.62]) (using TLSv1 with cipher DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA (256/256 bits)) (No client certificate requested) (Authenticated sender: lists@rewt.org.uk) by abby.lhr1.as41113.net (Postfix) with ESMTPSA id 3Zfv7R4PGLzss; Tue, 2 Apr 2013 03:12:03 +0100 (BST) Message-ID: <515A3E6C.7030404@rewt.org.uk> Date: Tue, 02 Apr 2013 03:11:56 +0100 From: Joe Holden User-Agent: Thunderbird 2.0.0.24 (Windows/20100228) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: Adrian Chadd Subject: Re: considering i386 as a tier 1 architecture References: In-Reply-To: Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Mailman-Approved-At: Tue, 02 Apr 2013 02:58:18 +0000 Cc: Eitan Adler , freebsd-arch@freebsd.org, FreeBSD Hackers X-BeenThere: freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.14 Precedence: list List-Id: Technical Discussions relating to FreeBSD List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Tue, 02 Apr 2013 02:12:12 -0000 Adrian Chadd wrote: > Why stop there? > > Noone runs FreeBSD on real hardware anymore. Except, say netflix. > > Let's just drop actual native hardware support and instead support > only the bare minimum needed to boot inside vmware, virtualbox and > xen. > > Anyone needing real hardware support can install NetBSD and xen. > The irony being that NetBSD runs on really obscure hardware but nothing that anybody anywhere uses? ;) > > Adrian > > On 31 March 2013 21:48, Eitan Adler wrote: >> Hi, >> >> I am writing this email to discuss the i386 architecture in FreeBSD. >> >> Computers are getting faster, but also more memory intensive. I >> can not find a laptop with less than 4 or 8 GB of RAM. Modern >> browsers, such as Firefox, require a 64bit architecture and 8GB of >> RAM. A 32 bit platform is not enough now a days on systems with >> more than 4 GB of RAM. A 32 bit core now is like 640K of RAM in >> the 1990s. Even in the embedded world ARM is going 64 bit with >> ARMv8. >> >> Secondly, the i386 port is unmaintained. Very few developers run >> it, so it doesn't get the testing it deserves. Almost every user >> post or bug report I see from a x86 compatible processor is running >> amd64. When was the last time you booted i386 outside a virtual >> machine? Often times the build works for amd64 but fails for i386. >> >> Finally, others are dropping support for i386. Windows Server 2008 >> is 64 bit only, OSX Mountain Lion (10.8) is 64-bit only. Users >> and downstream vendors no longer care about preserving ancient >> hardware. >> >> I hope this email is enough to convince you that on this date we >> should drop support for the i386 architecture for 10.0 to tier 2 >> and replace it with the ARM architecture as Tier 1. >> >> -- >> Eitan Adler