AMD and SuSE Porting Linux to Sledgehammer

-|Oblom|- writes "AMD has partnered with SUSE to port Linux to its upcoming 64-bit Sledgehammer chip. The story is on CNET and the projects site is here www.x86-64.org Well... I have been waiting for a while for this announcment. Hopefully by the end of next year I'll be running dual-core 1.5Ghz(at least) Sledgehammer with Linux on it"

Comments

More bits != More speed

[Chris Burke]

The reason to switch to 64 bits is not performance. Extra bits don't give you more speed. It only increases what you can do (which might possibly give more speed, but generally wider datapaths are slower, not faster).

The most important reason to want 64 bits is for server applications which want an address space larger than 4GB. 64 bits of virtual address space is the main attraction of these chips, and only for servers. Which is why Sledgehammer is being pushed as a server-only proc to compete with Merced.

You might get other benefits, like 64 bit integer ops being faster (but not necessarily... adequate bypass networks in a 32-bit proc might make this a wash). Which is only a benefit if your app uses lots of 64 bit integer ops.

There are also penalties -- for example, the page table hierarchy has 4 levels, which means more memory accesses on a TLB miss.

16->32 was different, because it also gave you all kinds of benefits like protected mode, virtual memory, and other stuff i'm too lazy to remember.
And 16 bits was never really enough.

Anyway, the point is that there is no real reason to worry about current apps moving to 64 bits when Sledge hits. Those server apps that will benefit will switch, and those that won't have no reason to (which is the true beauty of this processor).

Re:This shouldn't be hard

[Fizgig]

Well, it'll work with Linux right now, but you can't do anything 64-bit at all with it without a port. Sledgehammer has 3 modes. The first is legacy mode. You use that to run a 32-bit operating system and 32-bit applications. Linux will run in this way out-of-the-box. You can't run 64-bit applications in this mode and have to reboot to change. Then they have "long mode " which is split into two other modes, whose names I don't remember. Long mode runs a 64-bit operating system. The first of the long modes (compatibility mode or something) runs 32-bit applications on the 64-bit operating system. The second mode runs 64-bit applications. The two long modes can be changed by a context switch, so you can be running 64-bit and 32-bit applications on the same 64-bit OS.

SuSE

[MicroBerto]

It seems that SuSE is so involved in many projects out there, and doesn't get much credit. And they don't have a very large market share on the distribution level either. My favorite thing that they help a lot in is The Alsa Project (great sound drivers). SuSE certainly deserves more credit for helping keep Linux on the bleeding edge, so I just thought I'd toss that in.

Mike Roberto
- GAIM: MicroBerto

This shouldn't be hard

[cvd6262]

One of the comments (it might have been from Linus), when AMD announced their 64-bit chip was that this should be the easiest Linux port ever.

Is this because Linux can be so easily manipulated for it's host environment, or because it's just powerful enough to run already on a 64-bit machine?

Sledgehammer as a high end server platform?

[cheezus]

It's nice to see that the linux community is getting help from a corporation in supporting new hardware. It's a nice change from hardware vendors having to make sure their product is MS compatable, instead of vice versa like it should be

So what is AMD's plan? Is Sledgehammer going to be used in highend servers? If this is the case, I think they are definelty taking the right course in not only helping out linux, but also protecting their interests. It would be hard for other chip manufactures to compete with a more powerful platform that had multiOS support. Linux and (i'm gonna assume here) NT/2000 are a good start. Has there been any news from the BSD camp on a port? I mean, "of course it runs NetBSD", doesn't it?

---

AMD SMP

[Rayban]

Will we be able to finally get SMP with these AMD chips? Right now we have these amazing Athlons capable of symmetric multi-processing, but no mobo hardware support for them.

IMHO, AMD has gone the right way with x86-64, rather than a whole new instruction set. At this point in the game, I don't think they have enough market pull to convince people of once standard vs. another. It's a bit of a shame Intel and AMD couldn't have cooperated on a comment 64-bit spec, but I know exactly what sort of chance that would have (it involves a snowball and a very warm place...).

Re:AMD SMP

[snort]

This fall we'll have SMP Athlons. We're waiting for AMD's 760MP chipset... Supposed to do SMP and DDR SDRAM.

I just wish they'd kick me down a few engineering test samples.

Re:This is Big

[Oestergaard]

There is one problem though... We need the desktops using this processor if it has to be just remotely affordable, and if we want a decent number of motherboards to choose from

How cheap is the Xeon currently, even though it has very few benefits over the ``desktop'' processors such as Athlon or PII/III ? Not very. Why ? Because it's not sold in mind-boggling quantities. Well, also because Intel prices it in the high end, but that's a chicken-and-egg scenario wrt. the desktop market.

Currently, in this era of the lemming mentailty, we depend on MS windows processor support, if a processor is to be used very widely. Unfortunately this means, the Sledgehammer won't be affordable until MS releases an OS for it. Yes that sucks, but blame society :)

But yes, GNU/Linux support for the Sledgehammer some year or two ahead of Microsoft is going to give us great press. At least for a month or so. But counting in the long-term memory and interest in any kind of history (even just last year's history) of reporters, I doubt that we will benefit much from this once MS finally ships their OS for the Sledgehammer.

Don't get me wrong though. I think this is great, and the Sledgehammer may well prove as an alternative to the high-end and expensive Xeon CPUs from Intel, and they may well be used by those who need it enough to be able to afford it, for things like Oracle, SAP, weather forecasts, nukes, and what gives...
Way to go SuSE ! (and AMD!) :)

Re:Why Sledgehammer?

[iceT]

"Why did AMD name their new processor something like that? I mean, normally, you'd associate sledgehammers w/ something you'd want to keep AWAY from your computer."

Obviously, you've never worked with WindowsNT, have you?

Thanks for the info...

[ackthpt]

Dear Santa,

I've been a very very good boy this year. Please consider the following from my wish list:

AMD Sledgehammer

SuSE Linux

VIA PC 266 chipset (64bit equiv.)

DDR SDRAM

Mobo for all of that

Overclocking tips from Tom's

SCSI controller and 4x45GB 10000RPM drives

A 3D supported LCD letterbox montor

THX surround sound

DVD burner

A DSL provider who actually delivers

100 lbs Kona Espresso beans, 500 lbs mixed Jelly Bellies (no apple, please) & a Thai delivery which stays open past 10 PM

Thanks!

Vote Naked 2000