Quick tips for CPU identification

Some quick tips for CPU identification

How to tell if your processor is 64 bit?

To see if your processor is 64 bit, you can run the following command:

grep lm /proc/cpuinfo

If nothing is printed, it means that your CPU is not 64 bit. lm stands for Long Mode, so 64 bit CPU.

Example of a 64 bit machine:-

[root@server ~]# grep lm /proc/cpuinfo  

flags    : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 clflush dts acpi mmx fxsr sse sse2 ss ht tm syscall nx lm pni monitor ds_cpl est tm2 cx16 xtpr

Example of 32 bit machine:-

(empty output)

[root@desktop ~]# grep lm /proc/cpuinfo
[root@desktop ~]#

How to tell which version of Linux you are running? 32 bit or 64 bit?

To see if your running kernel is 64 bit, just issue the following command:

uname -m

x86_64 indicates a 64-bit kernel. If you use see i386, i486, i586 or i686, you’re running a 32 bit kernel.

Example of a 64 bit machine:-

[root@server ~]# uname -m  

x86_64

Example of a 32 bit machine:-

[root@desktop ~]# uname -m  

i686

How to check if your CPU supports hardware virtualization:-

To run KVM, you need a processor that supports virtualization; Intel and AMD both have developed extensions for their processors, respectively INTEL-VT and AMD-V. To see if your processor supports one of these, you can run the following command:

egrep '(vmx|svm)' --color=always /proc/cpuinfo

If nothing is printed, it means that your CPU doesn’t support hardware virtualization. Otherwise, it does - but you still need to make sure that virtualization is enabled in the BIOS.