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authorLinus Torvalds <torvalds@ppc970.osdl.org>2005-04-16 18:20:36 -0400
committerLinus Torvalds <torvalds@ppc970.osdl.org>2005-04-16 18:20:36 -0400
commit1da177e4c3f41524e886b7f1b8a0c1fc7321cac2 (patch)
tree0bba044c4ce775e45a88a51686b5d9f90697ea9d /Documentation/voyager.txt
Linux-2.6.12-rc2v2.6.12-rc2
Initial git repository build. I'm not bothering with the full history, even though we have it. We can create a separate "historical" git archive of that later if we want to, and in the meantime it's about 3.2GB when imported into git - space that would just make the early git days unnecessarily complicated, when we don't have a lot of good infrastructure for it. Let it rip!
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1Running Linux on the Voyager Architecture
2=========================================
3
4For full details and current project status, see
5
6http://www.hansenpartnership.com/voyager
7
8The voyager architecture was designed by NCR in the mid 80s to be a
9fully SMP capable RAS computing architecture built around intel's 486
10chip set. The voyager came in three levels of architectural
11sophistication: 3,4 and 5 --- 1 and 2 never made it out of prototype.
12The linux patches support only the Level 5 voyager architecture (any
13machine class 3435 and above).
14
15The Voyager Architecture
16------------------------
17
18Voyager machines consist of a Baseboard with a 386 diagnostic
19processor, a Power Supply Interface (PSI) a Primary and possibly
20Secondary Microchannel bus and between 2 and 20 voyager slots. The
21voyager slots can be populated with memory and cpu cards (up to 4GB
22memory and from 1 486 to 32 Pentium Pro processors). Internally, the
23voyager has a dual arbitrated system bus and a configuration and test
24bus (CAT). The voyager bus speed is 40MHz. Therefore (since all
25voyager cards are dual ported for each system bus) the maximum
26transfer rate is 320Mb/s but only if you have your slot configuration
27tuned (only memory cards can communicate with both busses at once, CPU
28cards utilise them one at a time).
29
30Voyager SMP
31-----------
32
33Since voyager was the first intel based SMP system, it is slightly
34more primitive than the Intel IO-APIC approach to SMP. Voyager allows
35arbitrary interrupt routing (including processor affinity routing) of
36all 16 PC type interrupts. However it does this by using a modified
375259 master/slave chip set instead of an APIC bus. Additionally,
38voyager supports Cross Processor Interrupts (CPI) equivalent to the
39APIC IPIs. There are two routed voyager interrupt lines provided to
40each slot.
41
42Processor Cards
43---------------
44
45These come in single, dyadic and quad configurations (the quads are
46problematic--see later). The maximum configuration is 8 quad cards
47for 32 way SMP.
48
49Quad Processors
50---------------
51
52Because voyager only supplies two interrupt lines to each Processor
53card, the Quad processors have to be configured (and Bootstrapped) in
54as a pair of Master/Slave processors.
55
56In fact, most Quad cards only accept one VIC interrupt line, so they
57have one interrupt handling processor (called the VIC extended
58processor) and three non-interrupt handling processors.
59
60Current Status
61--------------
62
63The System will boot on Mono, Dyad and Quad cards. There was
64originally a Quad boot problem which has been fixed by proper gdt
65alignment in the initial boot loader. If you still cannot get your
66voyager system to boot, email me at:
67
68<J.E.J.Bottomley@HansenPartnership.com>
69
70
71The Quad cards now support using the separate Quad CPI vectors instead
72of going through the VIC mailbox system.
73
74The Level 4 architecture (3430 and 3360 Machines) should also work
75fine.
76
77Dump Switch
78-----------
79
80The voyager dump switch sends out a broadcast NMI which the voyager
81code intercepts and does a task dump.
82
83Power Switch
84------------
85
86The front panel power switch is intercepted by the kernel and should
87cause a system shutdown and power off.
88
89A Note About Mixed CPU Systems
90------------------------------
91
92Linux isn't designed to handle mixed CPU systems very well. In order
93to get everything going you *must* make sure that your lowest
94capability CPU is used for booting. Also, mixing CPU classes
95(e.g. 486 and 586) is really not going to work very well at all.