Linux 7.2 has landed, dragging x86 timing clean out of the nineties by making the Time Stamp Counter mandatory.
I wrote up a quick article on why ditching those ancient legacy fallbacks is good housekeeping, plus a few other bits like cache-aware scheduling and memory tweaks worth noting.
Is anyone still using legacy hardware? If so, what do you use it for?
i486 is an antique now. It’s an artifact more expensive than less-ancient PCs.
It would require quite an expert to setup with a 7.X kernel, especially with network access.
I’m all for old hardware support, but there’s basically no scenario where this hurts anyone struggling to get by.