[wellylug] Sarge approaching release

[David Antliff]

On Fri, 3 Sep 2004, Martin Bähr wrote:

> On Wed, Sep 01, 2004 at 10:05:03PM +1200, David Antliff wrote:
> > > Hey all you Debianistas!
> > [snip words of a raving fanatic]
> > Wow, good to see the enthusiasm for i386 distributions isn't dead after
> > all...  :)
>
> i386 distributions?
> what do you mean?
> debian is not an intel distribution, it is meant to run on any hardware
> that can possibly supported.
>
> show me any other distribution that does that.
>
> sure debian could be i586 or i686, but what would be the point?
> wouldn't it be paradox to support old m68k hardware but not old intel?
>
> besides what would be the performance gain?
> really most of the gain is in having a kernel built for your cpu, and if
> you take a closer look, debian has those. that's most of the cpu support
> you need. anything else is not worth the hassle of having to provide
> multiple versions of a package.


I'll only reply once.

I was referring to the 386 CPU optimisations included in the Intel build
of Debian. I realise other architectures are supported too.

Supporting older processors is great, and that's Debian's niche. It's not
particularly well aimed at newer hardware, although it has no problems on
modern Intel-like platforms. Enabling Pentium-class CPU optimisations for
processors can significantly speed up many applications (especially
multimedia ones). Gains from further optimisations (i686, athlon-specific,
P4-specific, etc) are also beneficial to intensive computations. The
benefit is largely dependent on the nature of the programs however.

A kernel "built for your CPU" doesn't really offer much advantage for
'home' users - like any decent OS, Linux doesn't spend a significant
amount of time running in the kernel, so many optimisations offer little
improvement to a desktop PC. A heavily loaded host servicing many
connections at once will benefit more.

Personally I run Gentoo *and* Debian so I'm no stranger to pre-compiled
Debian packages for i386 or compile-to-install Gentoo packages.
CPU-specific optimisation doesn't always provide much improvement, but in
some areas it can be significant. Where necessary I've used apt-source to
compile packages with my own optimisations enabled.

My comment was just an irresistable imflammatory anti-Debian comment to
stir things up a bit. I'm not sorry for making it - you don't have to read
it and you certainly don't have to reply. The original post was pretty
stirring itself. A little zealotry here and there is all good. But thanks
for replying anyway.

I think Debian is doing the right thing actually - it would be far too
difficult to support multiple builds for what are basically compatible
platforms. Let other distributions cater to the need for speed some people
experience. I don't run Gentoo for performance reasons myself anyway, but
I do compile everything with -march=athlon-xp -O3 -pipe, which has proven
to be a stable combination on my hardware.

-- 
David.