From mboxrd@z Thu Jan  1 00:00:00 1970
Message-ID: <3c38e0973b81ee280f074f4647d3d05a@collyer.net>
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 02:24:41 -0700
From: geoff@collyer.net
To: mteege@gmail.com, 9fans@cse.psu.edu
Subject: Re: [9fans] Hardware for venti/fossil/cpu server
In-Reply-To: <88a4775604092201221495aa52@mail.gmail.com>
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I've never heard of the built-in Gbe.  You're probably better off
just buying an Intel PRO/1000 MT and putting it in.

SATA is supposed to just work, but I believe there's limited
experience with it so far on Plan 9.

The AMD64 shouldn't be a problem, as long you are content to run
it in 32-bit mode for now.  8[cal] don't yet generate the
instruction prefixes (prefaces?) for 64-bit addresses.

I'd also recommend avoiding built-in i8254[17]* controllers;
they aren't quite compatible with the igbe drivers in Plan 9
and need various bug workarounds in the drivers (no surprise,
the word `compatible' has been greatly watered-down by the
hardware vendors).  I may get around to adding those
workarounds, but the reference Linux driver from Intel is
10,000 lines long, so it may not happen immediately.

I've always distrusted hardware built into the motherboard
and the current round of built-in Gbe controllers is doing
nothing to change that distrust.  They're either broken
(the not-quite igbe), Broadcom or Brand X (Marvell).
I'm not sure how breaking the igbe controllers reduces
anybody's costs.