Re: [RFC] synchronized CPU count registers on SMP machines

[Ralf Baechle <ralf@linux-mips.org>]

On Wed, Jun 04, 2003 at 04:46:52PM -0700, Jun Sun wrote:

> Assuming SGI systems represent the past of MIPS, we are still ok
> future-wise. :)

You loose.  The reasons why SGI did construct their systems that way are
still valid.  It can be quite tricky to distribute the clock in large
systems - even for a moderate definition of large.  And for ccNUMAs which
are going to show up on the embedded market sooner or later it's easy
for the lazy designer to use several clock sources anyway.  Note our
current time code for will not work properly if clocks diverge on the
slightest bit - among other things the standards mandate time to
monotonically increase.

  Ralf