Downgrading from amd64 to i386

Andrew P. infofarmer at gmail.com
Sun Sep 18 03:30:45 PDT 2005


On 9/18/05, Sean <rsh.lists at comcast.net> wrote:
> Subhro wrote:
> > Andrew P. sat at his 'puter and typed on 9/18/2005 1:49:
> >
> >> Hello!
> >>
> >> I use FreeBSD/amd64 6.0 as the only OS on my desktop
> >> PC. Having carefully thought over pros and cons, I decided
> >> to downgrade to i386 for the time being.
> >>
> >>
> > What on earth does this mean? This is simply not possible. amd64 is a
> > completely different platform. i386 is a 32 bit platform and amd64 is a
> > 64 bit one. You can upgrade or downgrade from one version to other
> > provided the platform remains constant. But upgrading from one patform
> > to other involves buying and assembling physically different hardware
> > holding different copies of OS.
> >
> > Thanks
> > S.
> >
> 
> But the AMD hardware, for example I have a dual Opteron, can run in
> 64(amd64) or 32(i386) bit mode.
> So could you upgrade i386 to amd64 on such a system?
> Sounds interesting.
> 

Well, theoretically, it sure as hell is possible. I mean I have
cross-compiled dozens of programs, and they worked fine.
There are just too few people that have tried "cross-upgrading",
so I guess I'll have to stick to the backup-clean-install path.
What a pity.


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