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I have a server with Quad-Core Intel Xeon Processor 5300 Sequence. I would like to install the latest stable release of Debian on it.

But I'm confused by the number of installers available for download:

amd64
arm64
armel
armhf
i386
mips
mipsel
powerpc
ppc64el
s390x
source
multi-arch

I would like to install 64-bit system (there is enough RAM), so surely not i386, but which one? I know I should probably choose amd64 but this comes from what is more-heard-of, not from actual understanding.

I have found nothing in Intel's datasheet. On Xeon's wikipedia page it says that both IA-32 and x86-64 instruction sets are supported and names a number of microarchitectures like Haswell, Nehalem, etc. None of these names resemble anything from the list. I tried to google them individually but again no luck.

What is additionally confusing is the presence of "multi-arch" option which is said to cover both i386 and amd64. If so why are there are separate options in first place?

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  • 2
    AMD and Intel 64bit go under amd64 - Source: Debian's Hardware Info. The others are usually either Supercomputers or mobile phone sized processors. – Fiximan Aug 26 '15 at 20:46
  • @Fiximan Thanks, I think this answers my question in full. Would you post it as a full Answer so that I could accept it? – xaxa Aug 26 '15 at 21:21
  • It's a shame that this link is not on the page with installers... – xaxa Aug 26 '15 at 21:22
  • A FAQ is linked from the CD page. It should answer your question. – Ferenc Wágner Aug 28 '15 at 6:41
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You could use i386 (because your processor supports the IA-32 instructions) or amd64 (because of the x86-64 instruction set). If you want 64bit, you should use amd64.

There is a description of the different port on https://www.debian.org/ports/index.en.html:

amd64 - 64-bit PC (amd64)

First officially released with Debian 4.0. Port to the 64-bit AMD64 processors. The goal is to support both 32-bit and 64-bit userland on this architecture. This port supports AMD's 64-bit Opteron, Athlon and Sempron processors, and Intel's processors with Intel 64 support, including the Pentium D and various Xeon and Core2 series.

i386 - 32-bit PC (i386)

The first architecture, and not strictly a port. Linux was originally developed for the Intel 386 processors, hence the short name. Debian supports all IA-32 processors, made by Intel (including all Pentium series and recent Core Duo machines in 32-bit mode), AMD (K6, all Athlon series, Athlon64 series in 32-bit mode), Cyrix and other manufacturers.

The multi-arch installer is just an installer which supports the installation of both i386 and amd64 systems.

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