Hi Charles and all, Well, I understand your point of view, but you aren't really looking at the big picture. Yes, I understand from where you are sitting it looks like Microsoft and everyone else isn't taking you and others into consideration by moving to a 64-bit platform and abandoning 32-bit platforms. The problem here you are not seeing is that 32-bit processors and platforms can no longer keep up with the demands of newer operating systems and we are rapidly reaching the limitations of 32-bit technology. Its these technical limitations that 64-bit operating systems directly adress. Here is a quick overview of what I'm talking about.
RAM --- Todays operating systems like Windows Vista and Windows 7 need quite a lot of random access memory to run. At a bare minimum you need at least 1 GB, but 2 GB or more is really needed if you plan to run games, movies, and other applications in Windows. The problem with 32-bit technology is you are limited to 4 GB of addressable memory space which means weather or not you put 8 GB of RAM in your PC a 32-bit OS will only see and use 4 GB of memory. A 64-bit OS like Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit supports up to 128 GB of addressable memory space. This is more like what we need now considering the types of applications as well as high resolution video formats like blue ray uses quite a lot of RAM on their own. Performance --- Any application written for a 64-bit platform will out perform one written for a 32-bit or 16-bit platform. Although, much of what is improved probably won't be noticed by the average PC user the fact of the matter is that a 64-bit operating system, applications, file system, etc will improve over all performance of the PC in a number of areas regardless if you are aware of it or not. Precision --- One thing that makes 64-bit processors so much better is in terms of precision when it comes to performing any kind of mathematical calculation. Now, obviously a game like Blackjack would not overly be effected by this as we aren't doing any kind of serious scientific calculations. However, a game like Microsoft Flight Simulator X, which uses a lot of real time physics and extensive 3d graphics, would use the 64-bit processor to render sharper graphics and the physics engine would be far more accurate than on a 32-bit platform. Obviously, for serious mainstream gamers 64-bit is the way to go for more realistic high tech games. So how does all of this effect you personally? That's a good question. It really all depends on what you use the computer for. For the average home user who just browses the internet, reads e-mail, and chats on Facebook and Twitter the advantages of a true 64-bit platform is pretty nill. At most the average user might discover the computer performs a little better, boots faster, supports more RAM, etc but otherwise wouldn't see any advantage in it. The die-hard PC gamer would notice an advantage as the real time graphics, the physics engine, etc in their high-end PC games would be far superior to than those on a 32-bit operating system. A person who likes sitting back and watching blue ray dvds on their laptop might notice that the playback is smoother, sharper, and plays better on their 64-bit computer because the resources for all that high-end video is available. A person who likes recording and editing his/her high definition movies would have more memory and CPU power to edit their video files and burn them to blue ray dvd. Which brings up a technical point I didn't mention above. I think most people are aware the price of standard dvds are coming down in price, most cost about $5.00, and more and more stuff is being put out on blue ray dvd only. Many television channels are switching over to high definition video which can be recorded and burned to blue ray dvd with an extremely high degree of video resolution. Frankly put 32-bit computers aren't really up to the task of handling high definition video, blue ray, and so on do to memory and file size limitations in the technology. As said above you are pretty much limited to 4 GB of RAM and 32-bit versions of Windows has troubles with files over 4 GB as well. A high definition video file can be anywhere from 25 GB to 50 GB in size. A 64-bit platform can handle this issue easily, but a 32-bit platform can not. So the home user that records last nights Law and Order in high definition video, edits out the commercials, and burns it to blue ray is going to be limited by his CPU and memory if he is hoping to save that recording in high definition video format. So it logically follows that Microsoft and other developers in the computer industry are right there to see what is needed now, and to begin adopting a standard which meets today's technical requirements rather than hang onto 32-bit platforms which are now dated and unable to do everything that might be expected of them. Blaming Microsoft for this problem is like shooting the messenger without reading the message being given. Cheers! On 8/2/11, Charles Rivard <[email protected]> wrote: > If true, this is what bothers me about Microsoft. If the next version of > Windows must!, and that is the key word, must!, use a 64 bit machine, our > current machines won't be able to be current. They don't take that into > consideration. > > --- > "Security is not the absence of danger. It is the presence of the Lord." --- Gamers mailing list __ [email protected] If you want to leave the list, send E-mail to [email protected]. You can make changes or update your subscription via the web, at http://audyssey.org/mailman/listinfo/gamers_audyssey.org. All messages are archived and can be searched and read at http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the management of the list, please send E-mail to [email protected].
