Newsgroups: comp.os.msdos.programmer Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!think.com!snorkelwacker.mit.edu!bloom-picayune.mit.edu!athena.mit.edu!pshuang From: pshuang@athena.mit.edu (Ping-Shun Huang) Subject: Re: CMOS read/write & CPU + CPU SPEED tester In-Reply-To: pingel@jt.dk's message of 21 Jun 91 08:10:55 GMT Message-ID: Sender: news@athena.mit.edu (News system) Organization: Massachusetts Institute of Technology References: <824@jt.dk> Date: Sun, 23 Jun 91 19:59:26 GMT Lines: 23 In article <824@jt.dk> pingel@jt.dk (Soren Pingel Dalsgaard) writes: > also be tested. By the way: Is it possible to mix CPU type and > coprocessor? e.g. 386 + 287 or 286 + 387 etc, or is it enough to test > for CPU type and coprocessor, and then the coprocessor will be same type > as the CPU? It was possible on some of the older 386 motherboards to connect a 80287 coprocessor (they had the hardware socket for it). I don't know if any of the non-obvious combinations are acceptable. You should probably explicitly test everything. Don't make assumptions. New hardware can obviate old assumptions; e.g. some software assumed that if the CPU was a i486 that there would be a NPU, and so didn't test for one, and then Intel introduced the i486SX, which required bug-fix releases from disgruntled software manufacturers (can't blame the programmers, really, when Intel made such a big deal before about the fact that with its new generation of CPU's, *ALL* machines would ship with a math co-processor and software could count on having it there...) -- Above text where applicable is (c) Copyleft 1991, all rights deserved by: UNIX:/etc/ping instantiated (Ping Huang) [INTERNET: pshuang@athena.mit.edu]