32 Bit Vista vs 64 Bit Vista

Soldier4Real

Soldier4Real

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http://alienbabeltech.com/main/?p=5963&all=1

A well written article with all kinds of gaming benchmarks comparing 32 and 64 bit Vista. The bottom line is right now there really is no difference. If you're building a new system I would still go 64 bit even though there is no advantage in gaming. Also I read an article yesterday comparing 3GB, 6GB, and 12 GB of RAM and there was absolutely no difference except in certain multimedia applications such as video rendering. So the old adage that you need a 64 bit OS to utilize the extra RAM (above 4 GB) is true but there really is no advantage.
 
You mean I am not using all 8 Gb of Ram even with my vista 64bit OS? dammit.;..
 
Unless you're running Photoshop you need anything above 4 GB of ram. Only thing thing I found that helps is the speed of the ram. Its your choice between 32bit or 64bit OS. Games are slowly going into dual core anyways. Why not use a 64bit OS. Your gonna have to switch to it sooner or later.
 
I guess I am in luck then. I run Photoshop, Dreamweaver, and Illustrator all at the same time!
 
bf2 beta patch just said it was going to take advantage of 2+gb of ram now. i know 2142 doesnt care.

i have a dual core cpu (64bit), 4gb ram, sli, and nothing i play cares about those specs. maybe on day :(
 
There have been some titles for which dual-core makes quite a difference:
- Supreme Commander
- Far Cry 2
- GTA IV (even going from dual to quad matters with this one!!)

Also, it's not an "adage" that you can't use more than 4GB ram with 32-bit windows, it's a fact.

With 32-bit architecture / OS, it's physically impossible to address memory higher than ~4GB (2 to the 32nd address space * 8 bytes adressible exactly... you can do the math), so as far as the OS is concerned, and extra memory which might exist above adress space 2^32 is simply not adressible, and does not exist for all practical purposes (even though the hardware support is there with most modern systems).

Just go 64-bit. I installed vista 64 on my laptop for dual-boot to try it out, and even though I didn't like it in the end, I had no issues running 32-bit games or software at all. From my tests, performance differences are less than 5% between native 32-bit. MS really did an amazing job with the "emulation layer" for 32-bit apps, negligible penalty for the "emulation" of a 32-bit environment.

I'll go to 64-bit Win7 myself. No reason for 32-bit anymore.
 
No I wasn't disputing the fact of the 4GB limitation just that going to a 64 bit OS to take advantage of additional RAM generally has no benefit for gaming. I agree with going 64 bit because sooner or later 64 bit will be the de facto standard and software will be written and designed to take advantage of it. I was just saying that right now there is no real reason to go and purchase a 64 bit OS. But if you're buying a new OS anyway there is no cost difference.
 
I think the difference between 32bit & 64bit Vista Home is 10bones; The same price for Ultimate. On a benchmark note a slight increase with DDR3 compared to DDR2 so why waste the money on DDR3 for gaming. I does make a difference for photoshop.
 
The difference for me has been much greater stability with 6bg DDR3 in my newer i7 rig with Vista 64. The game ran the same with XP 32 and 4 gigs DDR2 1066 but was much more unstable when doing things like minimizing to desktop or having something run in the background. Again, no performance boost but my system has crashed once in two months and that was when the server was brought down and everyone on had to restart. Just my 2 cents . . . .
 
64bit FTW! I have 4gb right now but I will be upgrading to 8gb before too long and you need 64 bit to use beyond 4gb.
 
Don't know; my MB is triple channel so I went with 6 gigs thus I cannot say if 64 makes it more stable or the ability to access the extra ram does.
 
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