Windows Operating System X64 ???

[colormebad]

Does anyone know of an operating system besides windows 7' thats like xp pro with sp3 ' that will work on a 64bit system...I have the older xp pro sp1
x64..But can upgrade it' so its no good...7 runs smooth ' but wish control panel/device manager and some other places still looked like xp pro...Lots of older people i fix some computers for gets realy confused on windows 7...

[Scenic]

Re: Windows Operating System X64 ???

Unless you have more than 3GB of RAM, 32Bit versions of windows will be perfectly fine.

On CPUs supporting it, 64Bit is an option. It's not like.. necessary to run 64Bit software on them. All CPUs supporting 64Bit can run 32Bit software no problem.

In other words: Unless you have more RAM than a 32Bit windows could address (3.25GB i think it was), there's no need to run a 64Bit version. A "boring old" 32Bit XP SP3 would be fine.

[colormebad]

Re: Windows Operating System X64 ???

Unless you have more than 3GB of RAM, 32Bit versions of windows will be perfectly fine.

On CPUs supporting it, 64Bit is an option. It's not like.. necessary to run 64Bit software on them. All CPUs supporting 64Bit can run 32Bit software no problem.

In other words: Unless you have more RAM than a 32Bit windows could address (3.25GB i think it was), there's no need to run a 64Bit version. A "boring old" 32Bit XP SP3 would be fine.

This new asus came with 16G's of ram

[Uranium-235]

Re: Windows Operating System X64 ???

32 bit windows will work fine with 16g of ram, but it won't be able to see more then 3-4gb (usually 3.25 or 3.5)

[PCBONEZ]

Re: Windows Operating System X64 ???

Actually in 32-bit Windows with 16GB of RAM you can set up a RAM Disk in the upper 12GB and put a Virtual Dive in it which will kick ass on any SSD ever made.
-
Those that have tried it have gotten 'drive' transfer rates of as much as 32Gb/sec.
- Not a bad place to put your page-file during game sessions either.
Just don't run saves to the Virtual drive. Will go *poof* when you power down.
-
That's what gamers should be doing vice blowing money on SSD drives that are going to be junk in couple years.
-
-
Win 2003 Server is basically Windows XP-Server. Does x64 fine.
As it's a Server OS support will be better and should be around longer too.
.

[ratdude747]

Re: Windows Operating System X64 ???

Actually in 32-bit Windows with 16GB of RAM you can set up a Virtual Drive in the upper 12GB which will kick ass on any SSD ever made.
-
Those that have tried it have gotten 'drive' transfer rates of as much as 32Gb/sec.
- Not a bad place to put your page-file during game sessions either.
Just don't run saves to the Virtual drive. Will go *poof* when you power down.
-
That's what gamers should be doing vice blowing money on SSD drives that are going to be junk in couple years.
-
-
Win 2003 Server is basically Windows XP-Server. Does x64 fine.
As it's a Server OS support will be better and should be around longer too.
.

ditto. do that and you will have a rig

plus, keep in mind the page file is literally virtual memory... so in a way, you are literally allowing full access to all the ram in a "backwards" way.

[b700029]

Re: Windows Operating System X64 ???

There's a patch that enables 32-bit XP to use up to 64GB of RAM, just like with Vista 32-bit and 7 32-bit.

http://www.geoffchappell.com/notes/w...nse/memory.htm

The functionality was always there, MS just decided to keep it a secret.

...and they really try to keep it a secret, judging from what happened here:
http://www.msfn.org/board/topic/1335...windows-vista/

[PCBONEZ]

Re: Windows Operating System X64 ???

PAE is nothing new.

Been around since day one of Windows 2000 and MS has never hidden it's existence at all.
In fact they made a rather big deal about - 12 years ago when it was new.

It will let you use more RAM but you take a performance hit on Memory speed.

You can do -more- [multitasking] but you'll be doing it slower.
It's only recommended for use on Servers with multiple users.
.

[severach]

Re: Windows Operating System X64 ???

The performance hit was because the PAE page entries are twice as big as the non PAE entries. All memory managers now want the NX bit which is only accessible with PAE so they are all running with the large page entries no matter how much RAM you have.

Any performance hit should only appear when testing equal amounts of memory, something you might do while developing PAE years ago when 4GB of memory was a dream even for server admins. Falling DDR3 prices allows you to put in way too much memory which should more than offset the slight performance hit from PAE.

PAE does not do the page swapping done by non VM operating systems to expand memory beyond the normal bounds. Page swapping for all but specialized tasks like a disk cache wastes lots of CPU cycles copying memory around. PAE simply maps a real 64 bit memory block into a 32 bit VM. Every real memory block under PAE is accessed with a 64 bit address so it makes no difference whether the memory maps from above or below 4GB so long as there are no hardware or software limitations for 64 bit addressing.

PAE worked until Microsoft made it not work and guaranteed that it couldn't be made work with just a few patches. I suspect Microsoft is restrictive on PAE because it works far too well on a VM operating system. PAE had to be strangled to get Windows x64 to be adopted quickly. If not then x64 would be delayed forever until a killer app like World of Warcraft pulled the trigger and dropped x86 support. Imagine the hue and cry as gamers are forced to switch to this "new fangled x64 Windows that doesn't work worth a crap! Why can't Blizztard stick with what works?" The switch would never happen because page swapping in 3.5GB would be much less difficult than it was in 640K. Page swap libraries would pop up and Microsoft would have another dozen 3rd party runtimes to prop up until the end of time. Opening PAE to servers allowed large memory where it was desperately needed. The tiny audience guaranteed that PAE would be a stop gap solution that would largely apply to Microsoft Server apps then quickly vanish. It also allowed initial testing and development in a strict environment. Limiting PAE for desktops put the ball in Microsoft's court to bring in x64. No wasted time developing and maintaining page swap libraries. No waiting to see which developer is the first to decide that page swapping just won't work any more which may be never with 3.5GB to work with. Microsoft forces the switch and takes all the heat. Any problems are their own to fix and noone can complain. By pretending 4GB is the limit and forcing all users to 64 bit, the day developers (, developers, developers) will decide that 64 bit is widespread enough to target exclusively will come much sooner.

It was only necessary to limit PAE in Windows XP. Now that x64 is quickly taking over without minimal Microsoft doesn't care that Vista and Win7 can be patched into making PAE work. There are very few reasons to bother.

[jschiefer]

Re: Windows Operating System X64 ???

Does anyone know of an operating system besides windows 7' thats like xp pro with sp3 ' that will work on a 64bit system...I have the older xp pro sp1
x64..But can upgrade it' so its no good...7 runs smooth ' but wish control panel/device manager and some other places still looked like xp pro...Lots of older people i fix some computers for gets realy confused on windows 7...

You can change Windows 7 to use the old theme. When you have control panel up just choose small icons and it will be pretty close to XP.

[toastygoodness]

Re: Windows Operating System X64 ???

and classic... i always run win7 on classic. it's the closest to win2000 lol.