DOS ain't dead

Linux drops 386 and some 486 supports (Announce)

posted by bocke, 18.01.2013, 16:10
(edited by bocke on 18.01.2013, 16:40)

I browsed through the original patch and I didn't see any mention of FPU emulation code. It's mostly related to some CPU instructions 386 and some 486 clones (and Nexgen 5x86) might not have: cmpxchg, invlpg and xadd.

> -config X86_XADD
> - def_bool y
> - depends on !M386

> -#ifndef CONFIG_X86_CMPXCHG
> -/*
> - * Building a kernel capable running on 80386. It may be necessary to
> - * simulate the cmpxchg on the 80386 CPU. For that purpose we define
> - * a function for each of the sizes we support.
> - */

> -#if defined(CONFIG_X86_INVLPG) || defined(CONFIG_X86_64)
> -# define cpu_has_invlpg 1
> -#else
> -# define cpu_has_invlpg (boot_cpu_data.x86 > 3)
> -#endif

This will be effective from Linux 3.8 and on. So any other long term support version can still be used with 386 and unsuppported clones (2.34, 3.0, 3.2, 3.4). Some of those might be supported for the years to come.

Hope this helps. ;)

Edit:
You can find a list of LTS kernel versions on Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linux_kernel#Maintenance

I guess 3.2 LTS might be the best bet. It's used by Debian, Slackware and Ubuntu LTS.

Complete thread:

• Linux drops 386 and some 486 supports - RayeR, 18.01.2013, 13:42 (Announce)
  • Linux drops 386 and some 486 supports - bocke, 18.01.2013, 16:10
    • Linux drops 386 and some 486 supports - marcov, 18.01.2013, 16:44
      • Linux drops 386 and some 486 supports - bocke, 18.01.2013, 17:05
        • Linux drops 386 and some 486 supports - bocke, 18.01.2013, 17:10
          • Linux drops 386 and some 486 supports - Rugxulo, 18.01.2013, 18:04
      • Linux drops 386 and some 486 supports - bocke, 19.01.2013, 22:08
        • Linux drops 386 and some 486 supports - RayeR, 19.01.2013, 23:22
          • Linux drops 386 and some 486 supports - bocke, 20.01.2013, 19:06
  • Linux drops 386 and some 486 supports - Rugxulo, 09.01.2018, 01:57
    • Linux drops 386 and some 486 supports - bocke, 10.01.2018, 08:58
      • Linux drops 386 and some 486 supports - bocke, 10.01.2018, 09:04