Thank you Theo for the quick reply. I will give it a shot as it appears from your answer the newer Intel processors should have this functionality, albeit named very unconventionally. Would there be something in dmesg that would indicate proper W^X support once installed?
Maybe one of these days closed hardware vendors like Intel, Creative, etc., will open up a bit and provide the necessary support to people trying to write software that will flawlessly work with various hardware, much better than the original vendor could ever dream of doing. Best regards, Brian Drain -----Original Message----- From: Theo de Raadt [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, September 04, 2008 12:13 PM To: Brian Drain Cc: [email protected] Subject: Re: Intel x86-64 using the amd64 platform > I've read through the FAQ and done some searching on the mailing lists > + google, but I cannot find a definitive answer to my question. To > keep it simple, I'm looking at installing OpenBSD on a ThinkPad T61p > w/Intel Core 2 Duo. I've been reading that the amd64 platform will > work however the NX bit isn't supported. Not all Intel cpu's support it. > Intel has since come out with their own version of the NX bit for > whatever reason (shouldn't they have just copied it like they did > everything else?), the XD bit. It isn't their own XD bit. They just couldn't help letting the lawyers rename it and put a trademark on it. It works exactly the same. Except on some Intel machines where it does not exist, or where it is broken. > Has this been > implemented anywhere so that the amd64-bit platform, running under an > Intel proc, will support W^X? Most Intel processors now do it correctly. > If not it looks like I should stick with 32-bit... and if not, any > plans in the future on implementing Intel's specific XD bit? There is no Intel specific XD bit. It works 100% the same. It is identical. Intel just felt that they needed to rename everything because it would make things oh so much more clear.
