64 bit Vista Question

[AgustusM]

thinking about buying a new desktop and moving to 64bit.

I don't anticipate any trouble with any of my normal business apps, but not so sure about some of my games.

I play primarily text sims like FOF, OOTP and the like

anyone running 64 bit having any trouble/success with text sims on 64bit?

[SirFozzie]

Works fine for me (I play both OOTP and FOF on my 64bit Vista machine)

[AgustusM]

great - thanks.

any software you have had trouble with?

[SirFozzie]

No, not really. some programs (like Firefox) are faster on 32 bit then 64 bit, believe it or not, but you can always step down.

Actually, TEW before 2009 and WMMA 1 had some 64 bit weirdness (you were encouraged to save often)

[AgustusM]

again thank you very much - personal experience beats the hell out of wading through 9 million google hits.

[Atocep]

I built a new computer a few weeks ago and went with Vista 64 and I've had zero compatibility problems. I fully expected to run into some problems, but my experiences thus far are no different than when I was using Vista 32.

[sterlingice]

I went from XP up to Vista 64 on my new box and I haven't run across any compatibility issues either. I've been very surprised. However, you'll see a lot of old stuff runs out of the x86 folder, presumably not taking advantage of the 64 bits.

SI

[Daimyo]

Drivers used to be an issue for 64-bit more than software since the OS will just emultae 32-bit when it needs to. If you have a printer or other peripheral older than a few years you should check to make sure there is a 64-bit driver for it before you upgrade.

You really won't get any performance benefit out of 64-bit unless you're running some very specific types of software such as for research computing and/or that need more than 3GB of RAM per application. In fact, if you just run standard business apps and games almost everything will actually run under 32-bit emulation and will be slower (although probably not noticeably so).

[AgustusM]

thanks for all the great info guys.

I do have a question, if 64 bit isn't going to run anything faster (outside of say some cad stuff) and in fact might have a slight performance hit, why would I go with 64 when I could just stay with 32?

[sterlingice]

In the theoretical future, programs will be optimized for it. If they do, it will speed things up significantly as 32-bit addressing is a bit of a bottleneck

SI

[AgustusM]

Ah - in that case I think I might stick with the 32 bit.

In doing my research I came across an article that predicted 64 bit become the standard. Problem is that article is from 2003.

64-Bit Takes Off - PC World (http://www.pcworld.com/article/112749/64bit_takes_off.html)

[astrosfan64]

If you play Crysis it will take advantage of your 64bit machine and OS

[AgustusM]

I don't even know what Crysis is.

I generally only play text sim games and games like Civ.

I think between what I have learned here and from other research 2 things have become pretty clear:

1. the 64 bit machine was unlikely to cause a problem with any of the 32 bit software I use

2. I wasn't going to see much current benefit from the 64 bit, so I will just wait until the software catches up.

again thanks for all the feedback.

[Mac Howard]

The problems with 64 bit Vista were mainly caused by an absence of suitable drivers which I think has been rectified now. However, with the majority of current software, you will not see any advantage coming from the more powerful processor. But if you are not one of those who changes their PC every 12 months it may well be that in the future there will be an advantage.

As far as text sims are concerned I don't see a current 32 bit machine having problems with these for some years to come though I note that FM2009 does take up 1.7 Gbytes on my hard drive which would indicate there are some pretty hefty files in there and maybe future games will benefit from 64 bit. But I don't see that happening with other text sims for a while.

[AgustusM]

I actually do change PC's just about every 12 months, although the one I am replacing now is almost 18 months old. Another reason why I considered waiting till next go around.

It might be my faulty memory, or just the fact their is so much more to convert now - but I remember a much quicker adoption when we went from 16bit to 32 bit.

[GrantDawg]

I actually do change PC's just about every 12 months, although the one I am replacing now is almost 18 months old. Another reason why I considered waiting till next go around.

It might be my faulty memory, or just the fact their is so much more to convert now - but I remember a much quicker adoption when we went from 16bit to 32 bit.


Was that from Dos to Windows 95? No, it took a long time to get things that worked right with Windows 95. It always is a Cluster-f any time they make a major change like this. I would say Vista has actually been smoother than 95 or XP.

[sterlingice]

I don't even know what Crysis is.

There's always some big FPS with a crazy engine that is used to benchmark things because even Deep Blue, Skynet, HAL, and the computer from Tron all put together couldn't run it at 60 frames per second. Crysis is currently that game.

SI

[Mac Howard]

I actually do change PC's just about every 12 months, although the one I am replacing now is almost 18 months old. Another reason why I considered waiting till next go around.

In that case there probably isn't a great deal of advantage in going to 64 bits right now. Leave it a year.

It might be my faulty memory, or just the fact their is so much more to convert now - but I remember a much quicker adoption when we went from 16bit to 32 bit.

It must be over 12 months ago that I first heard of a problem with 64 bit on SaaP when someone emailed me they couldn't install it. It turned out in the end to be a problem with WinZip not SaaP. But I haven't heard of any problems since which either means there is no longer a problem or no one's taken up 64 bit :)

The software always lags behind the hardware and, in this case, I think many developers simply don't feel that anything is compromised with modern 32 bit systems. It may even be that hardware has reached a point where there are few applications used by the average user that needs more power currently and until such applications arrive - hd video perhaps - there simply isn't a point in moving up just yet. I probably have more applications on my machines than most users and spend more time on them than is usual but I certainly don't feel any need for a more powerful machine at present.

Sometimes the hardware simply gets too far ahead of the software.

[Rich1033]

Now I am no computer expert, but isnt one of the main advantages of running Vista-64 that it will recognize more than 3 gigs or ram? I have always read that the 32 bit caps out at 3.

[GrantDawg]

Now I am no computer expert, but isnt one of the main advantages of running Vista-64 that it will recognize more than 3 gigs or ram? I have always read that the 32 bit caps out at 3.


Yes.

[AgustusM]

I have a couple machines that have 4 gigs and XP only recognizes 3.

However Vista 32 did use, or at least report that it used all 4. Whether it actually did or not, I do not know.

[sterlingice]

Vista 64 recognizes all 8 GB I have

SI

[GrantDawg]

I have a couple machines that have 4 gigs and XP only recognizes 3.

However Vista 32 did use, or at least report that it used all 4. Whether it actually did or not, I do not know.


It didn't. 32 bits only actually uses a little over 3.