My new Athlon 64 3000+ powered PC arrives monday. Decision time is now what OS to run, i have a trial of the 64bit XP and will be looking to install that to give it a spin.

My question is 32bit apps run on this 32bit emulation thingy in the 64bit version, I am just interested in how this performs or would it be better to install a 32bit OS and rely on the AMD native execution of 32bit apps.

Also I understand that all drivers have to be 64bit, OK can get nvidia 64 bit drivers OK but nothing for my Belkin F5D7000 PCI Wireless card. OK I can go wired to the router so not really an issue but is there any drivers out there, as there is none at Belkin.

Also any comments in general about 64Bit greatly appreciated. Lots of questions I know, but i know you chaps can come up trumps with some answers.

TIA
Dave

If you are going wired to the router you don't need Belkin drivers. You use nvidia's 64 bit drivers for the Nvidia gigabit lan port.

Oh and about the 32 bit program things. It's kind of a toss-up. I have seen some reviews and benchmarks and on some 32 bit programs, they run just as well on 64 bit as they would 32 bit. Other ones run slower, and other ones actually run faster.

Going wired to the router is not the ideal solution but a work around for the time being.

My friend has a 64 Bit machine and i must admit it does fly, however he is running 32bit XP.

I currently have a 1.3Gig Duron 512 Meg, so am expecting a huge performance increase.

Ok I did a little googling.

First off I found this post:
"Based on the knowledge that windows has a supporting driver for the 54G Broadcom wireless chip, I searched around and found that one of the most common and inexpensive wireless card out there is the Belkin F5D7000 PCI or the PCMCI for laptops. Every here and there CircuitCity, Staples, BestBuy, OfficeMax or OfficeDepot have them on sale for $10 ~ $20 or even free after rebate. I got the F5D7000 PCI desktop card and it was automatically recognized when Windows 64Bit started as Broadcom 802.11g Network Adapter."

Finding the right drivers for you depends on which hardware revision you have. Try to figure out what version your wireless card is.

From that post which I don't know if it's true or not, if you have a version with broadcom in it then windows might supply the driver for you. I also found a link to a 64 bit ralink driver that works for the ralink version of the F5D7000.
http://www.ralink.com.tw/supp-1.htm

Hope this helps.

That is a great help - thank you very much indeed.

The hardware arrives monday so will build and post back - obviously all these little bits of knowledge from hands on experience are very useful.

Glad I could help.

A couple things you should know to get you started.

1. There is no 64 bit flash player. There is a 64 bit version of IE, but you won't be able to have flash on it. You will have to use the 32 bit IE for flash. If you have trouble with that you will find a lot of info from googling it.
2. You need to have a special antivirus program that is compatible with 64 bit. I recommend Avast! antivirus, it's a very nice antivirus program.
http://www.avast.com/
There is a professional version you can buy, or a home edition you can download for free!

Also:

Link to 64 bit Java 5.0 update 4:
https://sdlcweb1c.sun.com/ECom/EComActionSe...50C02834631EDDC
Select the one for "Windows AMD64 Platform"

Link to 64 bit .NET Framework 2.0 Beta 2:
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details...&displaylang=en

Hope you enjoy 64 bit. Once you work everything out it's great. I know I enjoy it!

Great, I just built a new Athlon 64 3200+ system, and even with plain old IDE drives, it runs like a Ferrari. You've made a good choice....



DO NOT INSTALL A 32BIT OS, you'll waste your time..... I installed Windows 2000 on mine previous to x64, and it just barely installed, it was so slow, I couldn't figure it out; even when I booted up it did not work worth anything, the response was so slow. That was something that I credit to trying to run a PCI-Express video card on a 32 bit operating system....... I thought I'd half killed the processor with how slow it was going.........

Just go ahead and get the x64 trial, you'll love it, until the "Playskool" theme gets to you, but then there is Royale after that.... I just went ahead and bought the x64 full version, and it runs perfect, no problems whatsoever..

Yes, that is perhaps the only downfall of x64, all drivers must be 64 bit drivers, there are no hacks or any other ways around it.... However, that problem is slowly disappearing, every day, more and more devices gain support with 64 bit drivers being developed for them, it would be best for now just to hook up a wired network connection into the back of the router with the lan port coming from your motherboard, there will be a compatible driver for that with your motherboard driver CD......



Well first of all, 64 bit is so much faster, even without hyperthreading.... It's been optimized time after time after time, and you'll notice that there will almost never be any lock ups because of too many programs running, mainly because of the CPU throttling "Cool 'n' Quiet" technology that AMD put in.....

I think you'll love it, keep us updated on the progress......

mrvader89

x64 windows supports hyperthreading, why wouldn't it? That has nothing to do with 64 bit. Hyperthreading is just a technology of Intel processors, like HyperTransport is for AMD processors.

Cool 'n' Quiet does not prevent lockups, in fact it actually decreases performance. Cool 'n' Quiet slows down your processor when you aren't using it much and then speeds it back up when you are gaming or something, I would recommend not using Cool 'n' Quiet at all, I think it sucks myself. Really only worth it if you have a laptop.

And are you sure that there are 64 bit drivers on the motherboard CD? Usually they just have the 32 bit drivers on there, and even if they do have 64 bit drivers they might be outdated. I think that's bad advice right there. Best thing is to go to nvidia's website and download the latest 64 bit drivers.

And how can you credit poor performance to running a pci-e video card on a 32 bit OS? A video card will run just as fast on a 32 bit OS as it will on a 64 bit OS because there aren't any video cards specially optimized for 64 bit.

I don't think getting the trial OS is a good idea to use seriously. If you want reliability and performance it would be best to get the full version.

Well posting this from my new PC!!

Firstly the new hard disk I ordered was DOA! so thats gone back so have just installed XP 32bit for time being, but even so it really flies. About 5 seconds to launch photoshop 7 is ok with me. I do a lot of Flash stuff and it just runs Flash MX pro without any problems. This was the main reason for upgrading my pc as my old Duron 1.3 was really having a hard time on big flash projects. My graphics card now runs at 8X and all in all very very happy.

I have cool and quiet running and to be honest like you say can not see any benefit in it - but just enjoying the playing about phase with my new toy!!

I will install the xp 64 bit trial when i get the replacement HD and will post back then on how that goes.

Thanks for all your input guys! really appreciated. For anyone wondering if to go 64 bit my answer is yes, even if you run xp 32bit you will see a huge improvement in processing power and general umph!!

Specs are: AMD Athlon 64 3000+ Newcastle, MSI K8TM-ILSR - mainboard, Nvidia GeForce FX5200 Graphics, 512 Meg RAM. SATA 80GB hard disk (DOA replacement due soon) so old hard disk 30Gig 133 IDE. So you can see cost was an issue but well chuffed with the computing power I have now for a very reasonable upgrade cost.

I've had no problems with Win X64. The only drivers I can't find are for my Kodak digital camera, my TV wonder tuner/capture, probably my Canon scanner, and an old Intel web cam. Printers installed okay

I'm surprised at digital cameras...none are available even for new cameras. I'm using my Kodak on my old Win XP system but I'd really like it under Win x64. Ditto TV Tuners. Zip available even new.

Regards, Ron

I hope its ok if i ask this in this thread...I was wondering do 32bit games like Call of duty,ut2k4,Farcry work on x64 windows? i never tryed it myself i kinda gave up after aol didnt work.

Well, I haven't tried CoD but it should play just fine. And UT2k4 and Farcry both play great. In fact, there's even a 64-bit patch for Farcry.

I know cod works im just wondering if games take advantage (32bit games) of a x64 OS.

Well of course they don't take advantage. They would have to be 64bit to take advantage.

There is actually a version of 64bit far cry that takes full advantage of 64bit. It gives you a better looking and smoother running game than the 32bit version.

You can see the improvements of the 64bit version here:
http://www.amd.com/us-en/Processors/Develo...5E10543,00.html