[ubuntu-in] Ubuntu 10.10 Maverick Meerkat Won't Run On Processors Below i686

[Ritesh Sinha]

On Wed, Jun 9, 2010 at 11:51 PM, K Ramnarayan <ramnarayan.k at gmail.com> wrote:
> See article below,
>
> Start Article
>
> Ubuntu 10.10 Maverick Meerkat Won't Run On Processors Below i686
> http://www.webupd8.org/2010/06/ubuntu-1010-maverick-meerkat-wont-run.html
> If you're planning on using Ubuntu 10.10 Maverick Meerkat on a computer with a
> processor older than i686, well... you can't.
>
> Ubuntu 10.10 will be dropping support for i386-i586 processors so it can take
> advantage of the i686 optimizations.
>
>
> But there seem to be some issues with this: even some new processors which are
> especially designed for low power consumption are i586. Such a processor is
> the Geode LX800 - a pretty new processor for which a bug has been filled on
> Launchpad but which most probably won't be fixed since Geode LX800 is a i586
> processor.
>
>
> Thanks to Manish for the heads up!
>
> end article
> ***
>
> My Thoughts:
>
> I thought that such moves were what M$ and FrApple would have done, make
> existing hard ware obsolete. If this is true its absolutely terrible news for
> ubuntu fans, what it might mean is migrating to another linux which will
> support a wider range of processors.
I don't think this is a big deal (well apart from the Geode issue
which is quite problematic and should be patched). Most desktop
systems today are running i686 and systems that require 586 support
can stick with the LTS which already supports them. I do not
understand the need to upgrade to the latest and greatest if you have
a machine that is working as required with the LTS. Yes there will be
the challenge of having certain _newer_ software features added but I
think it would be possible for package maintainers to backport based
on demand (case in point, we now have Firefox 3.xx being backported to
Hardy!!). It was inevitable, probably in a few years one would see
dropped support for 32 bit architectures.

>
> What do other folks think about this
>
> **
> To find out what processor you have use this in the command line
>
> -$ uname -m
>
> **
>
> ram
>
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