Upgrade to 64 Bit - Benefits?

UKMedia

UKMedia

Member
I have an established movies setup across HD TV, NAS devices and 2 PC's, with a similar setup as my system spec. My questions are:
  1. If I was to install a 64 bit OS (Vista or 7) would I get any improvement in stability or performance?
  2. On one PC I play BF2142 , am I going to have problems running this? - Sorry I know this isn't a Media Centre question
  3. Is it going to be worth the hassle of a clean install and load all my apps again?
UKMedia
 

My Computer

System One

  • Manufacturer/Model
    Self Build
    CPU
    Intel Quad Core QX6700 4 X 2.66M
    Motherboard
    ASUS Striker II Extreme
    Memory
    4 GB DDR3 1600
    Graphics Card(s)
    Nvidia 8800GTX 768MB PCI-E
    Sound Card
    SoundMax
    Monitor(s) Displays
    2 Flat screen 21" LG displays
    Hard Drives
    5 internal Hard Drives:
    2 x WD 500GB (CAVIAR BLACK 500GB 32MB 7200 SATA)
    3 x WD 1TB (CAVIAR BLACK 1TB 32MB 7200 SATA) as Raid 5 array
    PSU
    Tagan TG 1100W TURBOJET QUAD SLI
    Case
    Thermaltake EUREKA Case - Black
    Cooling
    ASUS V60 Quiet with additional fans for H/drives
    Keyboard
    Logitech G15 Gaming
    Mouse
    Logitech G7
    Internet Speed
    0.5 Mb - (Benefits of rural location!)
    Other Info
    Teaming 2 GB network connection to Wired 1GB switch.
    Connected to 22TB (Raid 5) of network storage on a wired 1GB lan.
    (Mixture of internal hard drives, 1TB, 2TB & 4TB Terastations)
There are 2 'main' differences between 32bit and 64bit namely:

-64bit allows for more than 2gb to be effectively used for a SINGLE application.
No game or video playback software at the moment would ever need more than 2gb of memory though.

-64bit enabled CPU's are able to process MORE commands at the same time (twice as many in fact) however there are hardly any programs/applications out there that can actually make use of this.
I don't want to go into too much detail because frankly its unnecessary and I don't know all that much about it to begin with but I can tell you that your games or video playback software will hardly (if at all) be able to make use of this extra processing power.

At the moment the critics are agreed that 64bit is only usefull for high-load operations such as video/audio editing which eats up loads of CPU and RAM, servers, scientific research computers and distributed computing (such as BIONC enabled stuff).

conclusion:
NO, you will most definatelly not get any noticable/worthwile improvement or increased stability.
 

My Computer

System One

  • Manufacturer/Model
    Me, myself and I
    CPU
    Intel Core 2 Duo E 8500
    Motherboard
    Asus P5Q3 DELUXE
    Memory
    4x 1GB DDR3
    Graphics Card(s)
    Asus GeForce 9800GTX+
    Sound Card
    SoundBlaster X-Fi X-treme gamer
    Monitor(s) Displays
    Samsung Syncmaster 226BW
    Screen Resolution
    1680 x 1050
    Hard Drives
    1x 250gb SATA
    4x 1TB SATA in RAID5
    PSU
    CoolerMaster 650Watt
    Case
    CoolerMaster 690
    Cooling
    4x 140mm, 3x 120mm, 1x 80mm casefans
    Keyboard
    Razer Lycosa
    Mouse
    Logitech G5
    Internet Speed
    ADSL 12mbit/s
    Other Info
    My other OS is a Linux =)
Ayporos said:
There are 2 'main' differences between 32bit and 64bit namely:

-64bit allows for more than 2gb to be effectively used for a SINGLE application.
No game or video playback software at the moment would ever need more than 2gb of memory though.
Click to expand...

Only for apps which are also 64-bit. 32-bit apps running on a 64-bit OS will still mostly limit themselves to 2GB maximum, although they can puff up to 4GB if they're capable of it.

Ayporos said:
-64bit enabled CPU's are able to process MORE commands at the same time (twice as many in fact) however there are hardly any programs/applications out there that can actually make use of this.
I don't want to go into too much detail because frankly its unnecessary and I don't know all that much about it to begin with but I can tell you that your games or video playback software will hardly (if at all) be able to make use of this extra processing power.
Click to expand...

I think you misunderstood something there. There's no doubling of command rates. There are benefits to be gained in stability and even security (much harder to inject bad or malicious drivers into kernel-mode under 64-bit), and there are some performance advantages stemming from the way that information is (more efficiently) passed around between functions in code, but there's no inherently overwhelming boost.

As for whether games and other software "will hardly (if at all) be able to make use of this extra processing power", you've probably heard of Moore's Law:

"The hardware horsepower of a typical processor will continue to double roughly every 18 months".

There's an equally accurate though far less well known corollary:

"But it doesn't matter because the software will always p##s away all those hardware gains, and then some" ;)
 

My Computer

System One

Vista 64bit is more secure, faster and stable, no doubt about it.

cheers...
 

My Computer

System One

  • Manufacturer/Model
    Gateway P7805u FX
    CPU
    Intel Core2Duo T9600 2.80GHz 1066MHz FSB
    Motherboard
    Intel PM45
    Memory
    8GB 1066MHz DDR3
    Graphics Card(s)
    Nvidia GeForce 9800M GTS 1GB DDR3
    Monitor(s) Displays
    LG 17" WUXGA TFT
    Screen Resolution
    1920x 1200
    Hard Drives
    WD 2x500GB
    Case
    notebook
    Other Info
    BT/BD
H2SO4 said:
Ayporos said:
There are 2 'main' differences between 32bit and 64bit namely:

-64bit allows for more than 2gb to be effectively used for a SINGLE application.
No game or video playback software at the moment would ever need more than 2gb of memory though.
Click to expand...

Only for apps which are also 64-bit. 32-bit apps running on a 64-bit OS will still mostly limit themselves to 2GB maximum, although they can puff up to 4GB if they're capable of it.

Ayporos said:
-64bit enabled CPU's are able to process MORE commands at the same time (twice as many in fact) however there are hardly any programs/applications out there that can actually make use of this.
I don't want to go into too much detail because frankly its unnecessary and I don't know all that much about it to begin with but I can tell you that your games or video playback software will hardly (if at all) be able to make use of this extra processing power.
Click to expand...

I think you misunderstood something there. There's no doubling of command rates. There are benefits to be gained in stability and even security (much harder to inject bad or malicious drivers into kernel-mode under 64-bit), and there are some performance advantages stemming from the way that information is (more efficiently) passed around between functions in code, but there's no inherently overwhelming boost.

As for whether games and other software "will hardly (if at all) be able to make use of this extra processing power", you've probably heard of Moore's Law:

"The hardware horsepower of a typical processor will continue to double roughly every 18 months".

There's an equally accurate though far less well known corollary:

"But it doesn't matter because the software will always p##s away all those hardware gains, and then some" ;)
Click to expand...


Thanks for the replies and you back up what I thought that the benefits don't justify the re-build time. It's strange that few people can justify moving to 64bit and yet the majority of system specs indicate a 64 bit install!! lol;)

UKMedia
 

My Computer

System One

  • Manufacturer/Model
    Self Build
    CPU
    Intel Quad Core QX6700 4 X 2.66M
    Motherboard
    ASUS Striker II Extreme
    Memory
    4 GB DDR3 1600
    Graphics Card(s)
    Nvidia 8800GTX 768MB PCI-E
    Sound Card
    SoundMax
    Monitor(s) Displays
    2 Flat screen 21" LG displays
    Hard Drives
    5 internal Hard Drives:
    2 x WD 500GB (CAVIAR BLACK 500GB 32MB 7200 SATA)
    3 x WD 1TB (CAVIAR BLACK 1TB 32MB 7200 SATA) as Raid 5 array
    PSU
    Tagan TG 1100W TURBOJET QUAD SLI
    Case
    Thermaltake EUREKA Case - Black
    Cooling
    ASUS V60 Quiet with additional fans for H/drives
    Keyboard
    Logitech G15 Gaming
    Mouse
    Logitech G7
    Internet Speed
    0.5 Mb - (Benefits of rural location!)
    Other Info
    Teaming 2 GB network connection to Wired 1GB switch.
    Connected to 22TB (Raid 5) of network storage on a wired 1GB lan.
    (Mixture of internal hard drives, 1TB, 2TB & 4TB Terastations)
Last edited:

My Computer

System One

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    Custom Build
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    Onboard
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    19" Widescreen LG
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    1400x900
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    2 x WD 500G
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    Coolermaster Silent Pro 700M
    Case
    Antec 900
    Cooling
    Tuniq Tower 120 LFB
    Keyboard
    Logitech EX110
    Mouse
    Logitech MX400
    Other Info
    Graphics Driver - 190.38
One of the best operating systems around :D
 

My Computer

System One

  • Manufacturer/Model
    Acer Aspire 5920gmi notebook
    CPU
    Intel Core 2 Duo T7300 2.00GHz
    Memory
    4GB
    Graphics Card(s)
    NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GS
    Sound Card
    Realtek
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    1280 x 800 x 4294967296 colors
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    crawl
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