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Date:      Tue, 14 Nov 2000 07:57:29 +0100
From:      Wilko Bulte <wkb@freebie.demon.nl>
To:        John Baldwin <jhb@freebsd.org>
Cc:        Poul-Henning Kamp <phk@freebsd.org>, arch@freebsd.org
Subject:   Re: RANDOMDEV inspired realitycheck regarding i386/i486...
Message-ID:  <20001114075729.G333@freebie.demon.nl>
In-Reply-To: <XFMail.001114100929.jhb@FreeBSD.org>; from jhb@freebsd.org on Tue, Nov 14, 2000 at 10:09:29AM -0800
References:  <11485.974210886@critter> <XFMail.001114100929.jhb@FreeBSD.org>

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On Tue, Nov 14, 2000 at 10:09:29AM -0800, John Baldwin wrote:

> On 14-Nov-00 Poul-Henning Kamp wrote:
> > 
> > If no /entropy is found it takes a full minute to do the randomdev
> > seeding during boot on a P5/133.
> > 
> > Has anybody run a 486 or 386 under current recently ?
> > 
> > Have we defacto discontinued them from current ?
> > 
> > I can see the advantage for the SMPng people in dropping the 386/486
> > and I'm approaching the level where I would be willing to say: "Sorry,
> > stick with 4.x for i386/i486".
> 
> Actually, the only pessimisms for SMPng are on the 386.  The 486 has the
> 'cmpxchg' instruction that makes SMPng go. :)

Dropping 386 seems sound to me. 486 probably has quite some users left.
DNS/NTP/whatever servers in dark corners come to mind. 

> > What is the consensus ?
> 
> What is the current processor of choice for embedded stuff?  Is x86 even a
> good architecture for embedded work?  That is the only place that I would see
> the 386 still being alive...

x86 has never been a good CPU for embedded. [eyes his trusty books
collection for Motorola's 680x0 ;) ]

-- 
Wilko Bulte  	 					Arnhem, the Netherlands
wilko@freebsd.org  	http://www.freebsd.org 		http://www.nlfug.nl



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