On 21 Jun 2008 at 21:43, Peter Ekkerman wrote:

> > P.S. Wonder why terms like i386 are still being used for folders - 386 
> > machines were long ago.
> 
> Yes how to confuse the business :)
> Initially used for Intel 386 processor based machines,
> the term I386 - while outdated - is still being used to indicate Windows 
> based Software and hardware.
> I586 is being used for Linux software.


  The original 8086/8088 had a single operating mode.  The 80s86 added a
second mode, and the 80386 added two more.  Until the introduction of
64-bit mode, that was the last change of that magnitude to the Intel 
consumer CPU line.  "i386" is a common designation in Microsoft and Linus 
usage for what Intel calls "IA32 architecture".

  Progress on CPU details didn't stop there, of course, but everything
ever written for a 386 will run on the latest models -- and probably 90% of
code being written for those latest models is at least *theoretically* 
capable of being run on a 386, although you'd want it overclocked by a 
couple of hundred times to be happy with the performance.


  But -- WHY is this the name of the folder containing the OS installation 
files?
  If we go back to the introduction of Windows NT in the mid 1990s, the OS 
originally supported four different CPU architectures, and so there were 
four such folders on the CD-ROM.  The other three have been abandonned over 
the evolution through Windows versions, as various CPU families have been 
disontinued or relegated to niche markets where Windows is not really an 
option, leaving only the Intel line supported in current/recent OS versions.

David Gillett

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