Hardware Question

[Scott Ehrlich]

On Tue, 31 Jul 2007, Nils Kassube wrote:

> Donald D Henson wrote:
>> 1. Does i686 always mean that the referenced processor/machine/platform
>> is 64-bit?
>
> No, it is 32 bit. The CPUs which are referred to by "i686" are usually 32
> bit CPUs. See <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I686>.
>
>> 2. Does i386 always mean 32-bit?
>
> Yes.
>
>> 3. If the 'uname' command reports that the machine/processor is i686
>> and that the platform is i386, does this mean that I am restricted to
>> 32-bit software?
>
> Yes and no. If your CPU understands 64 bit instructions, they should work,
> but what you get as 64 bit software probably needs the libraries compiled
> for 64 bit Linux. If you want to have 64 bit Ubuntu, you need the AMD64
> version.

One way to check your processor's 32 vs 64-bit capability:

- Try to boot or install a 64-bit version of an OS.  If the OS sees a 
32-bit processor, it will complain and instruct you to install the 32-bit 
version.

Scott

>
>
> Nils
>
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