On Mon, May 13, 2013 at 5:35 PM, Kyle Brantley <[email protected]> wrote: > In short, as per Intel, using the 6501 in a 64-bit mode is unsupported. With > that said, I've been > running my 6501s in 64-bit mode exclusively, ever since I got one (two weeks > after release?). > I've not had any problems with them, but then again, I may not be using them > in a way > that triggers issues, should there be any.
A few months ago I asked the question here about what the pros and cons would be of running the OpenBSD SMP kernel (bsd.mp) on the net6501, versus the standard uniprocessor kernel - seeing that the E6XX series has HyperTransport and therefore something approximating multiple cores. There wasn't, as I recall, any consensus, or even much information at all (*). So from this discussion, as far as I can tell, I have a choice of _four_ different OpenBSD kernels that could legitimately be booted on my net6501 and would probably run: 32-bit i386 uniprocessor 32-bit i386 SMP 64-bit amd64 uniprocessor 64-bit amd64 SMP I'm sure a similar list of possible alternatives exists for other BSD variants and for Linux. A different company than Soekris might do some quick testing, or at least provide some pithy engineering insight and give its customers a quick rundown from their point of view on the advantages and disadvantages of 32 vs 64bit and non-smp vs smp - whether in general, or for specific common application needs. But at the risk of being flamed here, I'll say that I'm not holding my breath for any information like that from the company anytime soon... If anyone has data points around these questions from actual personal experience and actual real-world testing, like Kyle's, I'm sure many would be grateful for that. D (*) beyond the knowledge that "pf" is still single-threaded, so if all you're using the box for is a packet filter/router, then smp won't help _that_ particular much _______________________________________________ Soekris-tech mailing list [email protected] http://lists.soekris.com/mailman/listinfo/soekris-tech
