Date: Sun, 23 Apr 2006 08:03:38 -0700 From: Garrett Cooper <youshi10@u.washington.edu> To: FreeBSD Questions <freebsd-questions@freebsd.org> Subject: Re: Quick Question Message-ID: <2829BA34-93B5-476D-9ED7-07273B67907C@u.washington.edu>
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On Apr 23, 2006, at 4:08 AM, fbsd wrote: > It would help if you would ask a question. > Nobody has ESP to read your mind. > > You have to provide background information with your question > so people on this list can grasp what you are talking about. > > > > -----Original Message----- > From: owner-freebsd-questions@freebsd.org > [mailto:owner-freebsd-questions@freebsd.org]On Behalf Of Joey F. > Sent: Sunday, April 23, 2006 6:52 AM > To: freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.org > Subject: Quick Question > > > I went to the downloads page but was not sure what I am supposed to > download. as far as "alpha, amd64" etc:/ If you could get back to me > ASAP it would be greatly appreciated. > > Thank You for your time! What you are talking about with the alpha, amd64 stuff is the specific architecture that the installation media was compiled for. For more information about computer architectures, refer to some of the following links: "What is computer architecture?": http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ Computer_architecture i386 architecture: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X86 alpha architecture (I believe): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DEC_Alpha amd64 architecture: discussion included in i386 link. powerpc architecture: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PowerPC If you have an intel or amd processor, then you have an i386 compatible machine. Depending on whether or not you have 64 bit computability though (which you probably should know based on either the name of the machine, or you should be able to search through the i386 link shown above and determine whether or not the machine is x86 or x64, searching for that should be trivial), things may differ to the extent that you may or may not be able to use the given CD compiled on the FreeBSD site. For example, AMD64 has a 64-bit mode (for 64-bit precision and all that), but has compatibility built in to be able to run 32-bit programs (which works nicely in 5.x and 6.x I have read in comparison to the <4.x series of FreeBSD). Some of Intel's 64-bit processors doesn't do that though (I'm specifically thinking of the older IA-64, or Itanium processors), while others do offer that functionality IIRC. HTH, -Garrett
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