Re: [tlug] Only 32bits for Linux on UltraSparc II :(

[Zuco Pietro <zucomailinglist@example.com>]

2005/8/20, Ulrich Plate <plate@example.com>:

> All those distributions that actually bother supporting the Sparc
> architecture to begin with keep their userland in 32-bit, even to hop
> along sparc64 kernels. There's an experimental set of ebuilds for
> Gentoo[1] that enables full 64-bit compilation which you can try out
> if you find that sort of thing amusing, but there really isn't much of
> a point to this exercise. When you run 64-bit programs, all they do is
> double the size of the registers, but - unlike AMD64 for example -
> their number stays the same. The only type of applications where that
> might make a difference are large databases or other mathematically
> fiendishly complex operations, but it's really only gobbling up twice
> the memory, without much of a speed-up. That overhead kills whatever
> benefit you'd expect from this, or so I'm told. If you want 64-bit
> userland, I suggest you try Solaris... :P

If Sun open it and make it free, as "libre" maybe I will use it, but
this can be another topic to discuss...

There is something I don't understand. If the benefit of use 64 bits
for userland applications is so poor, why spend time and money,
compiling an entire operating system to 64 bits as Solaris?
One of the elements of the race to improve performance is incrementing
from 16, 32, 64, and so forth. UltraSparc is useful only for large
databases or complex mathematical operations?
For example the X server will not be faster if it is 64 bits compiled?

Thanks

         Pietro.




-- 
------------------------
Pietro Zuco
email: zucocp@example.com
email: pietro@example.com