[Fwd: Re: i386 on AMD64 architecture]

Graham North northg at shaw.ca
Sun Sep 25 15:33:20 PDT 2005



-------- Original Message --------
Subject: 	Re: i386 on AMD64 architecture
Date: 	Sun, 25 Sep 2005 15:10:35 -0700
From: 	Graham North <northg at shaw.ca>
To: 	Micah <micahjon at ywave.com>
References: 	<433705B5.4020004 at shaw.ca> <43370B4B.8090501 at ywave.com> 
<43370D4F.8040008 at shaw.ca> <433718AF.10109 at ywave.com>



Thanks again.
Graphics is not a priority for my desktop applications - as long as it 
has something reasonable for desktop apps.   I am also happy to use a 
standalone NIC for the time being (and have a spare:--))  I am in the 
due diligence mode for the hardware at the moment.   It is actually 
tough finding what I want because ideally my preference would be an matx 
form factor to fit in a small case.   All the matx boards which I have 
looked at so far seem to have k8m800 Northbridge which does not seem to 
be well supported in BSD - somebody please put me right if I am 
wrong..!! or else nvidia, or sis760 - none of these seem to be solid 
with BSD.   So that leaves the k8T800 or K8T890.

If someone knows of a good 754 or 939 micro atx board which works well 
on Freebsd  then please let me know.
I am choosing the 64 architecture because later in its life I hope to 
retire this board to a light duty server and would like the Cool 'n 
Quiet features of the A64 architecture.

Graham/



Micah wrote:

>
>
> Graham North wrote:
>
>> Thanks Micah!
>>
>> Which version of FBSD are you using?   Your choice of MB looks pretty 
>> solid.   Can you recommend a good, supported (and cheap) video card 
>> as the A8V-E does not seem to have video.
>> Thanks again, Graham/
>>
>
> I'm using 5.4-RELEASE-p7 for the i386 install and 5.4-RELEASE for the 
> AMD64 install.  As for video, no particular recommendation.  I have an 
> ATI X300 SE by MSI.  It's a cheap ($60) PCI-EX card.  Unfortunately it 
> has no graphics acceleration under FreeBSD/XORG so I might as well 
> have bought a cheaper PCI card. :)  Other caveats: I've read that the 
> onboard NIC isn't compatible yet and I haven't tried the onboard wifi 
> or sata since I don't have any equipment to test them with.  I saw 
> some messages in one of the freebsd lists that indicates /someone/ is 
> working on the NIC though.
>
> Later,
> Micah
>
>
>> Micah wrote:
>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Graham North wrote:
>>>
>>>> It is my understanding that the AMD 64 family supports 32-bit i386 
>>>> code completely...can someone confirm this.
>>>>
>>>> I would like to stay with 32 bit for the time being but run it on a 
>>>> new MB using an AMD64 architecture.  Should I therefore be simply 
>>>> installing an i386 iso as though it is on an Intel machine? Will 
>>>> the i386 iso then have full support for AMD specific drivers such 
>>>> as the k8t800?  I noticed from this link  
>>>> http://www.freebsd.org/platforms/amd64/motherboards.html THAT the 
>>>> the VIA K8T800 and K8T890 seem to be reasonably supported whereas 
>>>> not many other current AMD Northbridges are (note however that  
>>>> this support is for AMD64 iso).
>>>>
>>>> Any pearls of wisdom much appreciated. No I do not wish to install 
>>>> as 64 bit at this time...
>>>> Thanks, Graham/
>>>>
>>>
>>> You'll probably get a lot of responses on this one.  I'm currently 
>>> running the i386 FreeBSD on an Ahtlon 64 as my desktop.  I also have 
>>> the 64 bit installed on a seperate partition to experiment with.  I 
>>> have an A8V-E mobo that has the K8T890.  Works just fine except an 
>>> occasional glitch while booting freezes the system.  I've read it's 
>>> an ACPI thing, but since I rarely reboot I've not bothered to 
>>> disable ACPI.
>>>
>>> Later,
>>> Micah
>>>
>>>
>
>

-- 
Kindness can be infectious - try it.

Graham North
Vancouver, BC
www.soleado.ca


-- 
Kindness can be infectious - try it.

Graham North
Vancouver, BC
www.soleado.ca


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