64 Bit or 32 Bit?

[RefaelBA]

I just bought a new PC, yay! It's based on the i7-920 CPU which is vey 64-Bit capable. I also have 6GB of Ram, a spacious HDD and a kickass mobo.

Naturally I thought it was time to move on to a 64Bit system, especially because of image and video proccessing, but then it came to me that some 32-Bit programs won't be able to run on my machine. Is that right? Will I really have to find 64-Bit versions of my programs and games? It that's the case, perhaps I'll stick with 32Bit until it's easier to make the move.

Thanks

[coder0xff]

Nope. 64-bit windows has something called WOW64 that lets 32 bit programs run on it. Besides that, you need 64-bits to use all 6GB of RAM. Literally. 32-bits can only recognize 4GB.

[Dr. Delta]

Nope. 64-bit windows has something called WOW64 that lets 32 bit programs run on it. Besides that, you need 64-bits to use all 6GB of RAM. Literally. 32-bits can only recognize 4GB.

Some programs have a building 'function' checking wheteir you're running 32 (x86) or 64 bit, but those have different version. A different 32 and 64 one.

Also on 64 bit you can't run 8bit apps anymore

Also 32 bit can adres 4gb in total, also some parts are used for video, hdd etc. so usually you can use (at max) 3.3 gb

raight

[coder0xff]

64 bit you can't run 16-bit apps anymore. 8-bit never existed on Intel PC platforms.

[EDIT]
This limitation still exists even in virtualization solutions like Virtual PC. If you use VirtualPC and install a 32-bit version of windows inside of it, it will still not run 16 bit apps. x64 processors actually aren't capable of running 16-bit apps. It's not just a windows limitation. You can however use something like Bochs emulator (and I think DOSBox works) because these don't use virtualization, but complete simulation- like a game console emulator.

[SotaPoika]

64bit is the way to go. 32bit is past/history.

[vcool]

64 is a cool number

[Guss79]

[quote="SotaPoika"]64bit is the way to go. 32bit is past/history.[/quote

32 bit is not past/history. The computer industry is still struggling with the idea of 64 bit... mainly because software can only be optimized for one or the other and software from what it seems is mainly 32 bit oriented/optimized. 32 bit has been around for quite sometime, its going to take a while to get rid of it completely. Dont mean to anger you btw, just had to throw that out there.

as for the thread, I suggest 64 bit because of the increased amount of RAM.

[Armageddon]

I use 16-bit. I pwn all.

[nub]

Uh well, I mean I was able to run plenty of 32 bit programs on 64 bit without any issues. If I'm correct, 64 bit just expands the capabilities of the OS. That doesn't mean it's not backwards compatible. There could be complications and such, like certain plugins in Photoshop only working for 32 bit, forcing you to run it in 32 bit mode. But things like that you can get used to I think.

Overall, 32 bit may not be obsolete, but 64 bit is obviously the best choice if you intend to have more than 3gb of RAM or use big programs that can make good use of 64 bit. If you're doing light gaming, then 32 bit would be more convenient I guess.

[joe_dirt976]

why you'll want 64 bit, especially with 6gb of ram
32 bit has 32 possible discrete values IE:
1x32 or 4,294,967,295 (bits) or ~4.2 GB of max ram. Thats for the whole system, including the vid card

64 bit has twice as many possible discrete bits...
1x64 or 18,446,744,073,709,551,615 (bits) 18.4 exa bytes (if i'm correct, calculator crapped out after 63)

I may have over nerded on that one but I'm trying to point out is that with a 32 bit system you may be hurting yourself in the long run due to the ~4gb max system memory at any given time. Are you going to need 18 exabytes? No, but I'm willing to bet you would like to use more than 4 GB.

[Angry Beaver]

for windows you end up with two Program Files

Program Files/
Program Files(x86)/

Anything in the first one is 100% 64-bit anything in the second one is limited to 32 bit. Older and crappier applications may have slight compatibility issues with 64bit, but the compatability modes and patches usually fix it.

in other words. DO IT

[xoqolatl]

This limitation still exists even in virtualization solutions like Virtual PC. If you use VirtualPC and install a 32-bit version of windows inside of it, it will still not run 16 bit apps.

Or just disable hardware virtualization in Virtual PC options

[Terr]

My stance is that I'm staying with 32-bit until I really find myself needing more than 4gb (technically, ~3.5gb) of memory to get anything done. So far being a conservative adopter has served me pretty well.

[Dr. Delta]

My stance is that I'm staying with 32-bit until I really find myself needing more than 4gb (technically, ~3.5gb) of memory to get anything done. So far being a conservative adopter has served me pretty well.

Did I also mention that 64 bit is also faster. (os wise)

[Psy]

Nobody should be using 32-bit nowadays unless they absolutely have to.