| 1 |
On 07/23/11 18:24, Alan McKinnon wrote: |
| 2 |
> On Saturday 23 July 2011 16:11:20 Mick did opine thusly: |
| 3 |
>>> So, if I choose the amd64 iso and Stage 3, it doesn't have to be |
| 4 |
>>> on an AMD machine? |
| 5 |
>> Correct, you will use this iso (or systemrescueCD or Knoppix) and a |
| 6 |
>> Staqe 3 equivalent to build a system on an Intel 64bit CPU. |
| 7 |
> Just to flesh it out a bit more: |
| 8 |
> |
| 9 |
> The name amd64 came about because it's the 64 bit instruction set that |
| 10 |
> AMD designed for their 64-bit chips. There was an earlier 64 bit cpu |
| 11 |
> from Intel, but we don't talk about it anymore (and it has nothing to |
| 12 |
> do with this topic). |
| 13 |
> |
| 14 |
> Anyway, the name is a nod to the company that designed it, and has |
| 15 |
> nothing to do with the manufacturer of your CPU. Intel later had to |
| 16 |
> eat humble pie and implement AMD's design just to stay relevant in the |
| 17 |
> market, that's why 64 bit Intel chips run on an architecture that |
| 18 |
> Gentoo calls amd64. |
| 19 |
> |
| 20 |
> The 32 bit design is called x86 because that was the general name in |
| 21 |
> use for 20+ years prior. Most other distros call the amd64 design by |
| 22 |
> the name x86_64 or similar, Gentoo is the most visible exception. |
| 23 |
|
| 24 |
Thanks for this, Alan! And thanks to all for the responses. |
| 25 |
|
| 26 |
Honestly, I wasn't so much worried about the hardware breaking. I took |
| 27 |
the leap and wiped Windows off my laptop and never had any issues. But |
| 28 |
I've never dealt with 64-bit stuff and I wanted to make sure that I made |
| 29 |
the right choices. Thanks to the feedback from this list, I am |
| 30 |
confident that I can. If I run into any problems, this will be the |
| 31 |
first place I turn! :-) |
| 32 |
|
| 33 |
Warranty is not a super huge issue. The computer I got was a super good |
| 34 |
deal - it came with 1 year warranty, but I never purchased extended |
| 35 |
warranty. And to be honest, I've had a total of 4 Dell computers and |
| 36 |
never had any hardware issues at all (touch wood!). My laptop is 4 |
| 37 |
years old and I've reinstalled Gentoo on it about 3 times - the original |
| 38 |
install, once because I screwed up the MBR when I hit the "media" button |
| 39 |
instead of the power button and then recently when I kept getting blocks |
| 40 |
for KDE packages and KDE had gone to KDE SC. |
| 41 |
|
| 42 |
Thanks, again! :-) |
| 43 |
|
| 44 |
Colleen |
| 45 |
|
| 46 |
|
| 47 |
-- |
| 48 |
|
| 49 |
Registered Linux User #411143 with the Linux Counter, http://counter.li.org |
Archives