AMD Am386 released March 2, 1991

(dfarq.homeip.net)

70 points by jnord5 hours ago

2 comments

burnt-resistor3 minutes ago
TI with the TMS9900 was in a similar position as IBM with the 386: both threatened their micro/minicomputer markets. This is why TI didn't release other TI-99-like machines.Edit: It might be cool to make a higher-spec TMS9900 home brew system.
Zardoz844 hours ago
> Technically, the Am386 could run Windows 95, but it wasn’t a great experience.Technically not. It can run it. Was slow? Yes, but my Am386DX40 keep working fine from 1991 to 1996. Running DR-DOS 6, MS-DOS 6.11, Windows 3.1 and finally Windows 95. And, of course, I could play DooM 2 on it. At some point, I got a math copro. Finally, my father upgraded the machine with an AMD 486DX5 133MHz.
- killerstorm2 hours ago
 My father got me a second-hand computer with Am386DX-40 somewhere around 1997, IIRC. An upgrade to older 286.It was two generations old at that time but still a lot of fun: it could run a lot of games (incl. DOOM, of course), programming (largely Turbo Pascal 7), and some word processing under Windows 3.11.I didn't bother with Win95, though.I've been using it up until 1999, when I finally got a then-modern computer with Windows 98. But in some ways MS-DOS felt more capable - I really knew what each file is for, what computer is doing, etc. I.e. the entire machine is fully comprehensible. You really don't get it with Windows unless you're Russinovich or something.So in a way 386 was a peak computer for me
- snarfy1 hour ago
 Which math copro? If you had a 386DX then I believe you had the math copro? The 386SX did not have an FPU and needed the additional 387SX.
 - to11mtm51 minutes ago
 > If you had a 386DX then I believe you had the math copro? The 386SX did not have an FPU and needed the additional 387SX.Neither had FPUs... Closest you can get is RapidCAD (which is really a 486DX adapted to 386 bus, IIRC it uses a 'jumper' for the 387 slot.)For 386, the difference between SX and DX was whether it was a 16 or 32 bit data bus.Where things can get more curious, is that some early 386 motherboards actually took a 287 instead of a 387...
- iberator4 hours ago
 NETBSD still can run on it too :) Best and most portable os in the history
 - messe3 hours ago
 > most portable osEh... I think the Linux kernel + your choice of libc/userland has it beat these days.
 - lproven1 hour ago
 The Linux kernel dropped 386 support fourteen years ago.<a href="https://www.theregister.com/2012/12/12/linux_no_longer_runs_on_386_cpus/" rel="nofollow">https://www.theregister.com/2012/12/12/linux_no_longer_runs_...</a>
 - messe1 hour ago
 I'm well aware, thank you. I'm not contesting ability to run on a 386, I'm contesting the title of "most portable OS".
 lproven47 minutes ago
 OK. In context -- discussing an article talking specifically about AMD 386 chips -- that was not at all clear.I was at a talk celebrating NetBSD's 30th anniversary. I wrote about it:<a href="https://www.theregister.com/2024/04/17/30yo_netbsd_releases_v10/" rel="nofollow">https://www.theregister.com/2024/04/17/30yo_netbsd_releases_...</a>They're well aware of this.But as Linux edges closer to dropping 32-bit x86 completely -- most distros already have -- I think NetBSD may suddenly regain some relevance in this specific area.There's also a new initiative to improve its jails facility:<a href="https://netbsd-jails.petermann-digital.de/" rel="nofollow">https://netbsd-jails.petermann-digital.de/</a>
 - anthk3 hours ago
 Modern Linux can't even scratch a 486 and some Motorola platforms. Or VAX. Heck, I run NetBSD 10.1 vanilla under simh 3.8 for 9front emulated on an amd64 laptop (old Celeron, 2GB). Slow, but enough to play Slashem.On portability on compilers, plan9/9front it's unbeatable. Do you now Go compiling from any OS to any arch? The same here, but just for an OS obviously. Albeit I can still run Golang under i386, and tools like Rclone under 9front i386. That's really cool.
 - messe2 hours ago
 That's a very limited view of what portability means.Driver support for a niche SoC? Good luck getting NetBSD on before Linux. The sheer amount of SoCs supported by the Linux kernel dwarfs anything NetBSD has to offer.
 spijdar2 hours ago
 Yeah, NetBSD's support for modern hardware isn't amazing compared to Linux. I love it (and run my personal web server on it!), but the portability thing feels like a meme from the 4.4BSD days, where it ran on basically every workstation platform.Like sure, it runs on my VAX, my Sun4/75, and my Alpha box, but it doesn't run on my POWER9 workstation nor does it run my Amlogic A311D ARM device (at least in a usable capacity), and I couldn't even get i.MX 8M running. I didn't try super hard, to be fair, but why would I burn cycles getting an OS with less peripheral support running when Linux "just works"?
 hulitu1 hour ago
 I don't think Linux "just works" on VAX, Sun4/75, or Alpha.My experience with Linux on a Sun Sparcstation 20 circa 2000 was that it was slow as hell compared to Net or OpenBSD.
 messe1 hour ago
 I doubt NetBSD "just works" fully on those systems either. I see a lot of rose tinted glasses when NetBSD portability comes up. Those older systems barely get stress tested, as the system has become too large to be self-hosted on them anymore and has to resort to using cross compilation to build a working base.At least OpenBSD, when it says it supports a platform, _actually supports that platform_, and the system is stable enough that it can build itself.
 - actionfromafar3 hours ago
 Modern Linux dropped support for a lot of old and niche CPUs.
 - messe2 hours ago
 And NetBSD is missing support for an order of magnitude more SoCs. I like NetBSD. I've run it on several systems in the past, and not just as a toy. I like the whole BSD family, and even deploy FreeBSD in production at work, and use OpenBSD on my home router. But NetBSD's claim as the most portable OS doesn't hold up these days.