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Should I go 32bit or 64bit?

aggiedude

New Member
I have a family member who is ready to purchase their next computer, so they turned to me to purchase it for them and get it running. This particular family member likes to be on a budget so I am trying to keep everything as cheap as possible while investing enough money into a new computer to make it last longer than a mere 1 or 2 years. Long story short, Dell has a decent deal going for a Core 2 Duo with 4gb RAM and a 500gb Hard Drive with a 19inch montior, graphics card, etc. - everything I am looking for and more, but they only offer Vista 64bit for the machine. I worry about compatiblity, am I gonna find myself in trouble when I can't install the software they have used forever? Has anyone had any experience with the 32bit to 64bit move, am I asking for too much trouble?

Thanks!
aggiedude
 
I run Windows Server 2003 64bit on one of my servers. It has a bunch of stuff installed that is not really made for a 64bit os however there is a folder on the system called Program Files x86. I have never seen any compatibility issues with 64 or 32bit systems. However I have never tried it with vista.

Will be interesting to see the outcome.
 
You could always uninstall the operating system and just reinstall Vista 32 Bit or XP 32 Bit. However, if you install XP 32 Bit you will run into the problem that your computer would only read 3GB out of the 4GB of RAM on your computer.
 
I run Windows Server 2003 64bit on one of my servers. It has a bunch of stuff installed that is not really made for a 64bit os however there is a folder on the system called Program Files x86. I have never seen any compatibility issues with 64 or 32bit systems. However I have never tried it with vista.

Will be interesting to see the outcome.
Works exactly the same. Get 64bit.
 
there are still a lot of programs out there that wont work on a 64bit machine, so, make sure whatever software that is a must have will work before making your mind up. i have used 64 and 32. they both run about the same on a 64bit machine. the 64 however will actually know how to utilize the 64bit processor better than the 32 bit, and you will get a bit more enhanced performance.
 
I wish I could go 64-bit. But, apparently I only have a 64-bit motherboard/cpu/ram. my hard-drive, dvd-drive, and wireless card must not be compatible with 64-bit. Probably because they are IDE & PCI.
 
If you going to just have 4gb ram I suggest stick with 32bit, if you want better performance go with 64bit and add more ram.
 
Go with 32bit, use 3gb RAM for the OS and dedicated 1gb of the remaining RAM to graphics, or boost the paging files/virtual memory etc.
 
I have been running Vista 64 Ultimate for over 4 months with no REAL issues. There is the glitch every now and again but generally it's pretty good. So I'd say go with 64 bit if you have 4 GB or more ram.
 
Thanks for all the feedback! I went ahead and purchased the computer with 64bit. I am going to be setting it up tomorrow so I will let yall know if anything goes wrong!
 
So all of the software loaded wonderfully. No hiccups. But - vista almost made me want to shoot something when I had to change ownership of files to copy them over from the old machine. Seriously! That damn os told me I didn't have permission to copy my own files, last time I checked I told the computer what to do not the other way around! Finally after eight hours and two routers - don't get me started with the router trouble and password protected printer sharing - I can say the computer is running great. But what a journey to get to this point. Conclusion - 64bit is awesome- vista continues to suck!
 
I actually have grown to love Vista. :) I bought a Quad-code 64-bit machine a couple of months ago, and it is super-fast. Up until then, I did not care for Vista, but when the computer can handle it well enough, it's actually pretty cool.
 
So all of the software loaded wonderfully. No hiccups. But - vista almost made me want to shoot something when I had to change ownership of files to copy them over from the old machine. Seriously! That damn os told me I didn't have permission to copy my own files, last time I checked I told the computer what to do not the other way around! Finally after eight hours and two routers - don't get me started with the router trouble and password protected printer sharing - I can say the computer is running great. But what a journey to get to this point. Conclusion - 64bit is awesome- vista continues to suck!
It's called security. You'd be complaining it didn't do all that when you wanted it.
 
It's called security. You'd be complaining it didn't do all that when you wanted it.

Not quite, I am glad that Vista is offering such security features, however, it needs to be easier to control. Perhaps if windows offered for me to setup security features when I first booted the computer or if there was an easy way to lower or turn off security for a little bit of time it would be different. Migration should be easier than Vista made it yesterday.
 
When my brother moved files from his old PC to his new one, he just plugged in the harddrive, opened it in Vista file browser, moved the files over - done. All he had to do was "Approve" the action when asked.

He did have a problem with the harddrive letter changing to D: as his default harddrive from C: - since D: was removed Vista had a problem finding it. A simple edit of the registry key from D: to C: fixed it. :)
 
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