linux-kernel - Re: Old platforms: bring out your dead

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Message-ID: <20210204210140.GB7529@amd>
Date:   Thu, 4 Feb 2021 22:01:41 +0100
From:   Pavel Machek <pavel@....cz>
To:     Andy Shevchenko <andy.shevchenko@...il.com>
Cc:     David Laight <David.Laight@...lab.com>,
        Arnd Bergmann <arnd@...nel.org>, Willy Tarreau <w@....eu>,
        Linux ARM <linux-arm-kernel@...ts.infradead.org>,
        Linux Kernel Mailing List <linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org>,
        Krzysztof Adamski <krzysztof.adamski@...ia.com>,
        Oleksij Rempel <o.rempel@...gutronix.de>,
        Baruch Siach <baruch@...s.co.il>,
        Russell King - ARM Linux <linux@...linux.org.uk>,
        Daniel Tang <dt.tangr@...il.com>,
        Uwe Kleine-König 
        <u.kleine-koenig@...gutronix.de>, Jamie Iles <jamie@...ieiles.com>,
        Barry Song <song.bao.hua@...ilicon.com>,
        Viresh Kumar <viresh.kumar@...aro.org>,
        Linus Walleij <linus.walleij@...aro.org>,
        Jonas Jensen <jonas.jensen@...il.com>,
        Marc Gonzalez <marc.w.gonzalez@...e.fr>,
        Hartley Sweeten <hsweeten@...ionengravers.com>,
        Lubomir Rintel <lkundrak@...sk>,
        Neil Armstrong <narmstrong@...libre.com>,
        Shawn Guo <shawnguo@...nel.org>, Alex Elder <elder@...aro.org>,
        Alexander Shiyan <shc_work@...l.ru>,
        Koen Vandeputte <koen.vandeputte@...ntric.com>,
        Hans Ulli Kroll <ulli.kroll@...glemail.com>,
        Vladimir Zapolskiy <vz@...ia.com>,
        Wei Xu <xuwei5@...ilicon.com>,
        Steven Rostedt <rostedt@...dmis.org>,
        Yoshinori Sato <ysato@...rs.osdn.me>,
        Mark Salter <msalter@...hat.com>,
        Michael Ellerman <mpe@...erman.id.au>,
        Geert Uytterhoeven <geert+renesas@...der.be>,
        Thomas Bogendoerfer <tsbogend@...ha.franken.de>
Subject: Re: Old platforms: bring out your dead

Hi!

> > > I think there were 486s with up to 256MB, which would still qualify as barely
> > > usable for a minimal desktop, or as comfortable for a deeply embedded
> > > system. The main limit was apparently the cacheable RAM, which is limited
> > > by the amount of L2 cache -- you needed a rare 1MB of external L2-cache to
> > > have 256MB of cached RAM, while more common 256KB of cache would
> > > be good for 64MB. Vortex86SX has no FPU or L2 cache at all, but supports
> > > 256MB of DDR2.
> >
> > There are also some newer (well less than 30 year old) cpus that are
> 
> (less than 10 years actually)
> 
> > basically 486 but have a few extra instructions - probably just cpuid
> > and (IIRC) rdtsc.
> > Designed for low power embedded use they won't ever have been suitable
> > for a desktop - but are probably fast enough for some uses.
> > I'm not sure how much keeping 486 support actually costs, 386 was a
> > PITA - but the 486 fixed most of those issues.
> 
> Right, we have "last of mohicans" (to date) Intel Quark family of CPUs
> (486 core + few i586 features).
> This is for the embedded world and probably not for powerful use.

We have open-hardware implementation for 486, AFAICT, thanks to MISTer
project. I'm not aware of open 586 core.

Being able to run recent Linux on open hardware sounds fun.
									Pavel
-- 
http://www.livejournal.com/~pavelmachek

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