Whats the difference between i386 and i586 installers for wine and mysql

jerome_isip · 11-25-2008, 06:39 AM

Could anyone explain to me whats the difference between an .i386 rpm from an .i386 rpm.

I do not know what to choose between the two for software such as wine and mysql. Please help me!

Every information will help.

lazlow · 11-25-2008, 06:47 AM

Quote:

an .i386 rpm from an .i386 rpm.

Assuming you mean i386 vs i586: When the package is compiled you can choose which CPU it is optimized for. Each new version of the cpu(386,....,686)added new instructions to there toolbox. So while a 686 can run code optimized for 386, a 386 cannot run code optimized for a 686(the code will contain instructions the 386 does not understand). That being said, most applications will not run significantly faster when compiled for 386 rather than 686, the exceptions are usually multimedia applications. So most packages are compiled 386 for maximum compatibility. If you have the choice and your machine can use the higher versions, higher is better (marginally).

farslayer · 11-25-2008, 08:40 AM

Good explanation..

The items that the 586 version will utilize will be things like:

(Keep in mind this list will cover 686 as well, so some of these may not be avail in the 586 version.)

Code:

Added with Pentium MMX
RDPMC*

Added with Pentium Pro
Conditional MOV: CMOVA, CMOVAE, CMOVB, CMOVBE, CMOVC, CMOVE, CMOVG, CMOVGE, CMOVL, CMOVLE, CMOVNA, CMOVNAE, CMOVNB, CMOVNBE, CMOVNC, CMOVNE, CMOVNG, CMOVNGE, CMOVNL, CMOVNLE, CMOVNO, CMOVNP, CMOVNS, CMOVNZ, CMOVO, CMOVP, CMOVPE, CMOVPO, CMOVS, CMOVZ, SYSENTER (SYStem call ENTER), SYSEXIT (SYStem call EXIT), RDPMC*, UD2

 * RDPMC was introduced in the Pentium Pro processor and the Pentium processor with MMX technology.

Added with AMD K6-2
SYSCALL, SYSRET (functionally equivalent to SYSENTER and SYSEXIT)

Added with SSE
MASKMOVQ, MOVNTPS, MOVNTQ, PREFETCH0, PREFETCH1, PREFETCH2, PREFETCHNTA, SFENCE (for Cacheability and Memory Ordering)

Added with SSE2
CLFLUSH, LFENCE, MASKMOVDQU, MFENCE, MOVNTDQ, MOVNTI, MOVNTPD, PAUSE (for Cacheability)

 Added with SSE3
LDDQU (for Video Encoding)

MONITOR, MWAIT (for thread synchronization; only on processors supporting Hyper-threading and some dual-core processors like Core 2, Phenom and others)

Added with Intel VT
VMPTRLD, VMPTRST, VMCLEAR, VMREAD, VMWRITE, VMCALL, VMLAUNCH, VMRESUME, VMXOFF, VMXON

 Added with AMD-V
CLGI, SKINIT, STGI, VMLOAD, VMMCALL, VMRUN, VMSAVE (SVM instructions of AMD-V)

 Added with x86-64
CMPXCHG16B (CoMPaRe and eXCHanGe 16 bytes), RDTSCP (ReaD Time Stamp Counter and Processor ID)

 Added with SSE4a
LZCNT, POPCNT (POPulation CouNT) - advanced bit manipulation

Not that you need to know what any of those are, just that they were added to improve performance for specific tasks.

Wikipedia has detail on them if you are interested.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MMX_(instruction_set)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streaming_SIMD_Extensions
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SSE2
etc...

jerome_isip · 11-26-2008, 04:26 AM

Sorry, I mean i586.

I thought it has something to do with the processor.
then if I will see rpm's with "i386" in its filename that means it will be compatible with an i386 architecture?

did i get it right?

pinniped · 11-26-2008, 05:00 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jerome_isip

then if I will see rpm's with "i386" in its filename that means it will be compatible with an i386 architecture?

did i get it right?

Yes; it will also be compatible with all future x86 family of processors (including AMD64/EMT64) because the instruction set used is a subset of the instructions on later CPUs in the family.