Re: What's the plan for powerpc64 in FreeBSD 16

On Mon, 9 Feb 2026 at 21:50, Mark Millard <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> A question may be how much of the powerpc64 hardware in folks hands that
> would otherwise develop/support one or both of the powerpc64{le,be}
> FreeBSD OS platforms is still just old Apple PowerMac G5 hardware? How
> many of those hands would not also have access to a powerpc64le as well?
> As I understand it, that old Apple PowerMac G5 hardware can not switch
> to the little endian mode intended: that mode came later.
>
> Old Apple PowerMac G5 hardware being uncommon compared to powerpc64le
> capable hardware could help point to targeting just powerpc64le. But if
> old Apple PowerMac G5 hardware is fairly common compared to powerpc64le
> capable hardware instead?

I spent a bunch of time earlier this year figuring out QEMU setups for
big/little endian
pseries guests for POWER8 and POWER9. POWER7 requires some love; it hangs
during boot.

In any case, "everyone" has access to the same fully emulated or
hardware accelerated
pseries guest support for both big and little endian systems.

(And yes, I just got SMP working again on G5.)

As for hardware - POWER8 is relatively cheapish but it's not easy to
host (they're loud
and power hungry), and it runs fine in both big and little endian
varieties. POWER9 is not
as cheap. Don't get me started on POWER10. :-) powermac G5 hardware is still
plentiful and relatively cheap.


-adrian