This option selects whether a 32-bit or a 64-bit kernel will be built.
There are five families of 32 bit PowerPC chips supported. The most common ones are the desktop and server CPUs (603, 604, 740, 750, 74xx) CPUs from Freescale and IBM, with their embedded 512x/52xx/82xx/83xx/86xx counterparts. The other embedded parts, namely 4xx, 8xx and e500 (85xx) each form a family of their own that is not compatible with the others. If unsure, select 52xx/6xx/7xx/74xx/82xx/83xx/86xx.
Provide support for processors based on the 603 cores. Those processors don't have a HASH MMU and provide SW TLB loading.
Provide support for processors not based on the 603 cores. Those processors have a HASH MMU.
There are two families of 64 bit PowerPC chips supported. The most common ones are the desktop and server CPUs (POWER5, 970, POWER5+, POWER6, POWER7, POWER8, POWER9 ...) The other are the "embedded" processors compliant with the "Book 3E" variant of the architecture
This will create a kernel which is optimised for a particular CPU. The resulting kernel may not run on other CPUs, so use this with care. If unsure, select Generic.
This must be enabled for running on e500mc (and derivatives such as e5500/e6500), and must be disabled for running on e500v1 or e500v2.
This must be enabled to support the Floating Point Unit Most 6xx have an FPU but e300c2 core (mpc832x) don't have an FPU, so when building an embedded kernel for that target you can disable FPU support. If unsure say Y.
This is the Performance Monitor support found on the e500 core and some e300 cores (c3 and c4). Select this only if your core supports the Embedded Performance Monitor APU
This option enables kernel support for larger than 32-bit physical addresses. This feature may not be available on all cores. If you have more than 3.5GB of RAM or so, you also need to enable SWIOTLB under Kernel Options for this to work. The actual number is platform-dependent. If in doubt, say N here.
This option enables kernel support for the Altivec extensions to the PowerPC processor. The kernel currently supports saving and restoring altivec registers, and turning on the 'altivec enable' bit so user processes can execute altivec instructions. This option is only usefully if you have a processor that supports altivec (G4, otherwise known as 74xx series), but does not have any affect on a non-altivec cpu (it does, however add code to the kernel). If in doubt, say Y here.
This option enables kernel support for the Vector Scaler extensions to the PowerPC processor. The kernel currently supports saving and restoring VSX registers, and turning on the 'VSX enable' bit so user processes can execute VSX instructions. This option is only useful if you have a processor that supports VSX (P7 and above), but does not have any affect on a non-VSX CPUs (it does, however add code to the kernel). If in doubt, say Y here.
This option enables kernel support for the Signal Processing Extensions (SPE) to the PowerPC processor. The kernel currently supports saving and restoring SPE registers, and turning on the 'spe enable' bit so user processes can execute SPE instructions. This option is only useful if you have a processor that supports SPE (e500, otherwise known as 85xx series), but does not have any effect on a non-spe cpu (it does, however add code to the kernel). If in doubt, say Y here.
Enable support for the Power ISA 3.0 Radix style MMU. Currently this is only implemented by IBM Power9 CPUs, if you don't have one of them you can probably disable this.
When the hardware supports the Radix MMU, default to using it unless "disable_radix[=yes]" is specified on the kernel command line. If this option is disabled, the Hash MMU will be used by default, unless "disable_radix=no" is specified on the kernel command line. If you're unsure, say Y.
Enable support for Kernel Userspace Execution Prevention (KUEP) If you're unsure, say Y.
Enable support for Kernel Userspace Access Protection (KUAP) If you're unsure, say Y.
Add extra debugging for Kernel Userspace Access Protection (KUAP) If you're unsure, say N.
This option enables sysfs file creation for PMU SPRs like MMCR* and PMC*.
This enables the powerpc-specific perf_event back-end.
This enables support for systems with more than one CPU. If you have
a system with only one CPU, say N. If you have a system with more
than one CPU, say Y. Note that the kernel does not currently
support SMP machines with 603/603e/603ev or PPC750 ("G3") processors
since they have inadequate hardware support for multiprocessor
operation.
If you say N here, the kernel will run on single and multiprocessor
machines, but will use only one CPU of a multiprocessor machine. If
you say Y here, the kernel will run on single-processor machines.
On a single-processor machine, the kernel will run faster if you say
N here.
If you don't know what to do here, say N.
This symbol controls whether we build the 32-bit VDSO. We obviously want to do that if we're building a 32-bit kernel. If we're building a 64-bit kernel then we only want a 32-bit VDSO if we're also enabling COMPAT.
This option selects whether a big endian or little endian kernel will be built.
Build a big endian kernel. If unsure, select this option.
Build a little endian kernel. Note that if cross compiling a little endian kernel, CROSS_COMPILE must point to a toolchain capable of targeting little endian powerpc.