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Date:      Thu, 16 Aug 2001 03:29:05 -0400
From:      "Andrew C. Hornback" <achornback@worldnet.att.net>
To:        "P. U. (Uli) Kruppa" <root@pukruppa.de>
Cc:        <questions@FreeBSD.ORG>
Subject:   RE: Multi-CPU system [was:Re: your mail]
Message-ID:  <00ee01c12625$2155c880$0e00000a@tomcat>
In-Reply-To: <20010816075141.S672-100000@localhost.de>

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> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG
> [mailto:owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG]On Behalf Of P. U. (Uli)
> Kruppa
> Sent: Thursday, August 16, 2001 3:59 AM
> To: Kris Kennaway
> Cc: OLGA PAVLENKO; questions@FreeBSD.ORG
> Subject: Multi-CPU system [was:Re: your mail]
>
> On Wed, 15 Aug 2001, Kris Kennaway wrote:
>
> > On Wed, Aug 15, 2001 at 09:44:39PM -0700, OLGA PAVLENKO wrote:
> > > To support senter:
> > > I would like to know if FreeBSD is compatible with sony vaio
> sr 7k using windows professional 2000.
> > > Thanks.
> >
> > In what sense do you hope FreeBSD is "compatible with Windows
> > Professional 2000"?
> >
> > They are two "competing" (in the sense that you can't run both at the
> > same time) operating systems.
> Of course this is completely off-topic and I am a complete
> ignorant but
> could one run two OS's at the same time on a dual-CPU
> machine?

	Nope.  Due to the way that the APIC / SMP design is for IA based machines,
this wouldn't be possible, or even practical.  Imagine having two separate
OSes trying to use the same memory address space, or the same peripherals...
I can see it now... Win2k wants the mouse to go to the right, X wants the
mouse to go to the left... you end up with a core dump, BSOD or reboot.

> Are there "inexpensive" methods to make one's PC run a
> second CPU (Something like a PCI-card)?

	There's a company in England (name escapes me at the moment) that produces
basically an Alpha system on a PCI card.  I contacted them at one time about
building a monster machine with over 100 processors (you can get PCI bus
extenders that are daisy chainable) and they came back with a quote that
about knocked me over.  At a quantity of 100 cards, I got a price break DOWN
to US$5800 each.  Needless to say, that project died a quick, silent
cribdeath.

	Depending on your definition of "inexpensive", US$5800 might be what you're
looking for.

	Sun also used to produce an ISA and PCI card that would allow you to
basically put a Sparc in your PC.  These cards are pretty rare anymore (I'd
love to find one myself).  They had the processor, Sparc system RAM, and I/O
ports onboard... I believe they could use the PC's SCSI Controller or had
one of their own.  Solaris on Intel basically put hardware out to pasture.

	There are also various Transputer cards, etc. out there that would be
interesting toys to play with, but they're generally $$$^X.

--- Andy
P.S. - If anyone has one of those Sun PCI cards for sale/trade, please
contact me immediately.


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