Is Any Intel Core 2 Core Duo Processors Compatible with FreeBSD?

[andrew clarke]

On Mon 2014-02-17 23:18:46 UTC-0800, Steve Booth (gotee_rustypaws at yahoo.com) wrote:

> I need to replace the CPU in my motherboard and I am planning to
> install FreeBSD. It appears in the FreeBSD Hardware Notes that Core
> Duo is not compatible.

If you read closely this only applies to the amd64 version of FreeBSD.
It is because the original Core Duo doesn't support 64-bit mode
required by FreeBSD-amd64.

Note the Core Duo and Core 2 Duo are different CPUs.

Evidently this has come up before:

http://lists.freebsd.org/pipermail/freebsd-questions/2012-January/237144.html

> If none of those processors are compatible, would a Core 2 Extreme
> Quad Processor work? The motherboard is using an LGA 775 socket and is
> supposed to support both processors.

It should be fine.

Any Intel or AMD CPU made in the last 15+ years intended to run
Windows will also run FreeBSD.

Worst case, on some lower-spec CPUs, only the i386 version of FreeBSD
will work, which restricts you to a maximum of 4 GB memory (among
other things). In contrast, the amd64 version has practically no
memory limit.

Most modern CPUs made since 2006 will run both the i386 and amd64
version of FreeBSD.

Regards
Andrew