[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote in article <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>... > Craig writes: > > No Linux will ever work on an xt or a 286. They are missing neccessary > > bits of hardware called a MMU which protects the memory. A 386SX is the > > minimum. > > The 8088 used in the XT is lacking an MMU, but the 80286 used in the AT is > not. Several versions of Unix were available for the AT.
The differences in the memory management architechture on the 286 and the 386 are major. Virtual memory paging and segments larger than 64K just two important things that the 386 has that are missing on the 286. I'm not saying that the 286 is not a superneato processor which was quite impressive (16?, 17? ) years ago, but there is a reason that The Great One (LT) chose the 386 for his initial experiments. One could write something for the 286 based on the "Linux Philosophy" and even call it the Linux kernel, but its executable format is not going to look a lot like ELF. Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think AT&T System V ever ran on 286s. Xenix, Minix, and Coherent are the main derivatives I can think of that ran on 286s. - Marsh
