Instruction
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Under processor architecture refers to the family and generation of processors, which have its own set of commands. The choice of a suitable distribution of the operating system in accordance with the characteristics of the processor allows to achieve maximum productivity in work with computer.
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The architecture of processors of Intel, as a rule, is designated as x86 and refers to the stones of the collections, i286, i386, i486, etc. Processors from other companies (AMD, Apple, VIA was compatible with Intel and had a similar classification. Then began to give them names that had gradually become an independent trademark. It complicated their classification.
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Look at the model of your CPU in the technical documentation. If its value matches the Pentium (except for the Pentium 4 Extreme Edition, Celeron, Celeron D, Xeon, AMD K5, K6, Duron, Athlon, Sempron, a processor has the x86 architecture. If the processor is marked as Opteron, Athlon 64, Athlon XII, Sempron 64, Turion 64, Pentium D, Xeon MP, Atom 230, Atom 330, Core 2 Duo and a MacBook, it has the architecture x86_64.
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Knowledge of architecture is required in distributions are open source. Otherwise, a wrong selection, the system will not install or will not function correctly.
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To determine the architecture you can use special software programs for Windows, such as Everest or CPU-Z. They will show support for AMD64 or EMT64.