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Using 32bit vs. 64 bit


albertwt

Which type of Windows 7 you use ?  

43 members have voted

  1. 1. Which type of Windows 7 you use ?

    • 32 bit
      9
    • 64 bit
      34


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AMount of RAM is the main consideration here.

under 4 gigs? Use 32 bit

Over 4 gigs? use 64bit...

Make those 4GB 3GB ;). Even if you plug in 4GB with a 32bit OS you will most-likely "see" only 3.25GB.

yes I do have more slots to upgrade my machine, so it is actually better in gaming performance or not rally for gaming (eg. for graphics design only ?)

For gaming 32bit would be faster in most cases. For heavy load graphic design a 64bit OS and 4GB (and up) would be better.
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Note the OS itself tends to run faster on the same hardware under 64bit, as you're talking about double the CPU registers available, plus you don't have the kernel virtual address space layout limitations that you do on 32bit (they're less with dynamic memory allocations, but you're still limited to 2GB of kernel virtual address space by default).

I don't think you'd see any real problems with using 64bit over 32bit, although for moderate use you probably won't see any tangible benefits either without having more than 4GB of RAM in the system. However, if you ever want to upgrade in the future (not sure how you feel about upgrading, but it is a consideration for some people), it's likely Win8 will not have an x86 variant and be x64 only, meaning no x86 Win7 to x64 Win8 upgrades (upgrades between like architectures only).

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  • 10 months later...

As quoted above - I have no experience - you might find x64 to be faster if you have 3.2 + GB of ram. I have 6 gb - but am not a heavy graphics user.

On the flip side, migrating from XP-SP3 to win7 was painful enough. It took me over a month to get all my background configuration scripting files working. It is proving close to impossible to adapt these Win7 x86 scripts to work under Win7 x64. If performance is not an issue I would say stick with 32 bit version.

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  • 2 weeks later...
  • 1 month later...

64bit is better and dont let anybody say it ain't

its especially better in a domain environment and I've managed 2 second logins which is unheard of!

the only thing to watch out for if you are working in a domain enviroment is "PRINTERS"!!!! thats where the headache is :o))

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Depends on your compatibility requirements; If you want to run older stuff (Esp Win2k-era or older) then Win7 64-bit will just cause headaches.

If you won't be touching older stuff, go 64-bit - Aside from backwards compatibility, it is better than 32-bit in all areas.

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