[LinuxBIOS] Socket 370 thought....

joe at smittys.pointclark.net joe at smittys.pointclark.net
Fri Nov 16 13:42:21 CET 2007


Quoting popkonserve <popkonserve at gmx.de>:

>> I beg to differ Holger, I have bought these on ebay cheap, and they work
>> just fine on boards that support them.
>>
>> http://cgi.ebay.com/New-370-CPU-Celeron-3-Converter-Socket-for-Tualatin_W0QQitemZ230192200737QQcmdZViewItem?hash=item230192200737
>>
>>
>> Here is one for 15$
>
> THOSE adapters only reroute some signals. they leave the vcore
> generation completely untouched and you can easily burn your board's
> regulators.

How? I thought FC-PGA2's have a lower voltage requirment than FC-PGA's.

> that's why they are so cheap. additionally those adapters
> don't change voltage levels of some important signals esp. PWRGOOD. this
> signal needs a level of 2.0V according to intel's specs. on some boards
> it is just connected to vcore. with vcore way below 2.0V the cpu will
> never start, not even with this adapter.
> everyone with medicore soldering skills could rework a S370 to achieve
> the same within 5 minutes.
>
> but apart from all this: the bios (not even linuxbios) can distinguish
> between a fcpga/fcpga-ii board and a ppga only board.

That's a good thing right? This way you can do some things you  
normally wouldn't be able to do. Like, the wiki home page says  
"Various non-standard scenarios (e.g. FPGA in Opteron socket)"

> only if all boards
> were handtested by someone. this leads me back to my first thought: all
> slot1 and s370 boards get support for all slot1 and s370 cpus. the bios
> picks the correct handling routine during runtime like current bioses
> do,too.
> Holger
>
Correct me if I am wrong, but isn't it ok if the LB processor code is  
a bit generic. All it needs to do is get Linux going and as long as  
the Linux kernel is able to detect the processor (vender/device id,  
etc) it can take over and unleash the processors full capabilities?

Thanks - Joe




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