5 ms·

At this point i386 is legacy for most of the world. OpenBSD is an ultra-conservative, orthodox project, therefore they will probably support i386 for years into

At this point i386 is legacy for most of the world. OpenBSD is an ultra-conservative, orthodox project, therefore they will probably support i386 for years into the future - I mean, they supported VAX until 2016. That is a choice they are entitled to make, the trade-off being it would appear to make most modern technologies a poor fit for adoption in OpenBSD - that's the price they have to pay. It is a problem of their own making.

Paianni 9y ago
If OBSD feels it can make use of older arches then so be it, many users will find less intensive jobs for the respective hardware and it saves it from going to waste/recycling.
- yellowapple 9y ago
  Not to mention plenty of people in the "developed" world (let alone "developing") can't afford to buy a new computer, and thus are going to use 32-bit "legacy" desktops and laptops for a very long time.
  - Paianni 9y ago
    Unfortunately those sorts of people tend to be less informed about I.T and that eventually leads to their NetBurst, Pentium M and Atom machines performing even slower than they would be if they were maintained probably. They probably waste more power waiting for the machines to accomplish their tasks in an under-maintained state.
Annatar 9y ago
OpenBSD is an ultra-conservative, orthodox project, ...which is exactly the kind of a system one needs for production environments.
kps 9y ago
“i386” is OpenBSD's label for the 32-bit Intel architecture (they don't actually support the 80386). Intel still sells these.
- Paianni 9y ago
  They support 486's though, which is quite rare for 2017.
  - emidln 9y ago
    486s and 586s are still sold for usage as embedded systems. They are well understood and some of them managed to pass certification decades ago.
    - cat199 9y ago
      not to mention, 386 or not, there's still other 'odd' 32bit platforms which still have huge use for embedded things where openbsd would work great (hello mips/arm32, for starters)
    - kps 9y ago
      You can still buy 32-bit Xeons, even. Sometimes srs bsns requires stability, too. https://ark.intel.com/Search/FeatureFilter?productType=processors&FilterCurrentProducts=true&InstructionSet=32-bit&FamilyText=Intel%C2%AE%20Xeon%C2%AE%20Processors https://ark.intel.com/Search/FeatureFilter?productType=proce...
  - JdeBP 9y ago
    There's a 32-bit x86 processor in every PC with the Intel Management Engine version 11 or later.

Paianni 9y ago

If OBSD feels it can make use of older arches then so be it, many users will find less intensive jobs for the respective hardware and it saves it from going to waste/recycling.

yellowapple 9y ago
Not to mention plenty of people in the "developed" world (let alone "developing") can't afford to buy a new computer, and thus are going to use 32-bit "legacy" desktops and laptops for a very long time.
- Paianni 9y ago
  Unfortunately those sorts of people tend to be less informed about I.T and that eventually leads to their NetBurst, Pentium M and Atom machines performing even slower than they would be if they were maintained probably. They probably waste more power waiting for the machines to accomplish their tasks in an under-maintained state.

Annatar 9y ago

OpenBSD is an ultra-conservative, orthodox project, ...which is exactly the kind of a system one needs for production environments.

kps 9y ago

“i386” is OpenBSD's label for the 32-bit Intel architecture (they don't actually support the 80386). Intel still sells these.

Paianni 9y ago
They support 486's though, which is quite rare for 2017.
- emidln 9y ago
  486s and 586s are still sold for usage as embedded systems. They are well understood and some of them managed to pass certification decades ago.
  - cat199 9y ago
    not to mention, 386 or not, there's still other 'odd' 32bit platforms which still have huge use for embedded things where openbsd would work great (hello mips/arm32, for starters)
  - kps 9y ago
    You can still buy 32-bit Xeons, even. Sometimes srs bsns requires stability, too. https://ark.intel.com/Search/FeatureFilter?productType=processors&FilterCurrentProducts=true&InstructionSet=32-bit&FamilyText=Intel%C2%AE%20Xeon%C2%AE%20Processors https://ark.intel.com/Search/FeatureFilter?productType=proce...
- JdeBP 9y ago
  There's a 32-bit x86 processor in every PC with the Intel Management Engine version 11 or later.