Intel IA-32 Manuale Utente

Vol. 3A 10-45

For IA-32 processors that support the PAT, the IA32_CR_PAT MSR is always active. That is,
the PCD and PWT bits in page-table entries and in page-directory entries (that point to pages)
are always select a memory type for a page indirectly by selecting an entry in the PAT. They
never select the memory type for a page directly as they do in earlier IA-32 processors that do
not implement the PAT (see Table 10-6).

To allow compatibility for code written to run on earlier IA-32 processor that do not support the
PAT, the PAT mechanism has been designed to allow backward compatibility to earlier proces-
sors. This compatibility is provided through the ordering of the PAT, PCD, and PWT bits in the
3-bit PAT entry index. For processors that do not implement the PAT, the PAT index bit (bit 7 in
the page-table entries and bit 12 in the page-directory entries) is reserved and set to 0. With the
PAT bit reserved, only the first four entries of the PAT can be selected with the PCD and PWT
bits. At power-up or reset (see Table 10-12), these first four entries are encoded to select the
same memory types as the PCD and PWT bits would normally select directly in an IA-32
processor that does not implement the PAT. So, if encodings of the first four entries in the PAT
are left unchanged following a power-up or reset, code written to run on earlier IA-32 processors
that do not implement the PAT will run correctly on IA-32 processors that do implement the PAT.