OT Linux (RE: [rescue] OT: Stuffed Proliant?)

[Joshua D Boyd]

On Sat, Dec 22, 2001 at 07:56:09PM +0100, Jochen Kunz wrote:
> > IMHO it's the software not the hardware that makes x86 look so bad

> And the architecture in general. x86 is 32 bit that is a too less
> addressrange for higher needs. (e.g. RDBMS) There are a lot of legacy
> artifacts (i.e. the compatibility need to be able to still boot MSDOS
> 1.0) in the architecture that imposes some limitations.

The 32bit limit isn't too bad.  For one thing, it is a 32bit per page limit.  
You actually can have 36bits of address space.  So, if you partition you DB
into 4gig pages, then you can handle 64gig DBs.  Still too small for some
users, but will work for quite a lot of people without problem, even people
who would be pushing their machines really hard other wise.

What limitations are imposed by DOS 1.0 compatibility?  I know that resources 
are wasted by DOS compatibility, but I didn't know that it actually limited 
anything.

On a side note, I recently came across references to a monster DOS program
called Heavyworks.  Apparently people running it have to run pure MS-DOS 
machines, and need hundreds of gigs in hard drive space.  I guessing that these
hard drives are being used raw since MS-Dos certainly doesn't support file 
systems that large.  Still, I was impressed that someone was shipping high end
dos programs still at all.

-- 
Joshua D. Boyd