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#1
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How is RAM Different with 64bit OS ?
Hi,
I've never used a 64bit OS. I have 32bit OS and 3GB of RAM. It's enough RAM for most anything I've tried. I'm not even sure 32bit XP can effectively use over 2GB. But if I switch to 64bit Win7 how does that change things? Is it that it's faster but hogs more RAM or will 3GB be enough for average use? Thanks. |
#2
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How is RAM Different with 64bit OS ?
goldtech wrote:
Hi, I've never used a 64bit OS. I have 32bit OS and 3GB of RAM. It's enough RAM for most anything I've tried. I'm not even sure 32bit XP can effectively use over 2GB. But if I switch to 64bit Win7 how does that change things? Is it that it's faster but hogs more RAM or will 3GB be enough for average use? Thanks. My laptop runs Windows 7 64 bit, on 3GB of RAM. When you offer the OS more RAM, it just caches more things with it. Up to around 1GB or so occupied. On WinXP, you might have seen 200-300MB or so for that kind of thing. As for the amount of memory a process can use, that is documented here. On a 32 bit OS, users are used to seeing a 2GB limitation per program. My old copy of Photoshop, would stop at around 1.8GB, rather than go to exactly 2GB. http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/libr...78(VS.85).aspx I don't really think you'll see much difference between a 32 bit and 64 bit OS, for the modern OSes. Especially if your needs are modest. If you run half a dozen virtual machines at one time, then additional memory space comes in handy. And the purchase of more memory helps. For a lot of other day to day activities, I doubt you'll see a big difference. Adobe products, some of the latest versions, are 64 bit only. And that would be another incentive to go 64 bit, if you were a photographer or did other multimedia things. If you don't use Adobe, then that aspect is a don't care. Paul |
#3
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How is RAM Different with 64bit OS ?
On Sat, 21 Sep 2013 15:03:00 -0700 (PDT), goldtech
wrote: Hi, I've never used a 64bit OS. I have 32bit OS and 3GB of RAM. It's enough RAM for most anything I've tried. I'm not even sure 32bit XP can effectively use over 2GB. But if I switch to 64bit Win7 how does that change things? Is it that it's faster but hogs more RAM or will 3GB be enough for average use? Thanks. Try some 64-bit programs and judge for yourself;- or, run it from a Solid State Drive, which runs at some magnitude closer to system memory, addressed by and in some instances conjointly by the CPU, over conventional media, such as magnetic media sprayed on cardboard within 180Kilobyte floppy disc casings. Run XP, through a W7 virtual box, even. Of course, a limit to XP at 2GB memory is as needless to mention when considering eight, or more, over two cores;- effectively, I'm not really quite up on how many cores W8.1 covers within that particular contingency during such as these days, when people are migrating in virtual droves, no doubt, to wris****ch cloud subscription computers, of sorts, I'd imagine. |
#4
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How is RAM Different with 64bit OS ?
"goldtech" wrote in message
... I've never used a 64bit OS. I have 32bit OS and 3GB of RAM. It's enough RAM for most anything I've tried. I'm not even sure 32bit XP can effectively use over 2GB. But if I switch to 64bit Win7 how does that change things? Is it that it's faster but hogs more RAM or will 3GB be enough for average use? 3Gb RAM works fine on an (oldish) Gateway laptop with 64-bit Win7. User experience seems to be that Win7 is "suboptimized." Win7 does many OS functions faster or better than XP; and adds useful new ones, e.g. its self-repair routines (albeit fully automatic, so the user cannot see what is going on and some nonfunctional features of the GUI are infuriating, viz. any window's switching to maximum size if its top edge touches the top of the screen. -- Don Phillipson Carlsbad Springs (Ottawa, Canada) |
#5
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How is RAM Different with 64bit OS ?
On 21/09/2013 6:03 PM, goldtech wrote:
Hi, I've never used a 64bit OS. I have 32bit OS and 3GB of RAM. It's enough RAM for most anything I've tried. I'm not even sure 32bit XP can effectively use over 2GB. But if I switch to 64bit Win7 how does that change things? Is it that it's faster but hogs more RAM or will 3GB be enough for average use? Well, there is a 32-bit version of Win7 which has system requirements pretty much similar to 32-bit XP. "Pretty much" is of course a relative term to Microsoft, which has a habit of loading down more and more junk into the OS with every new version that it brings out. So even a very comfortable XP-32 system might become a barely livable W7-32 system. If you want to know what a comfortable system in W7-64 would be, I'd say that the sweet spot is right now 8GB. 4GB tends to be quite tight, while 16GB might be overkill for most desktop needs. The main advantage of more RAM is of course that more of the RAM can be used by a 64-bit system, so there will be less stuff needed from the disk (or SSD). This speeds up system performance and responsiveness. I wouldn't consider going to a 32-bit system anymore these days, it's just not going to be able to handle today's memory requirements. Yousuf Khan |
#6
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How is RAM Different with 64bit OS ?
On Sat, 21 Sep 2013 15:03:00 -0700 (PDT), goldtech
wrote: Hi, I've never used a 64bit OS. I have 32bit OS and 3GB of RAM. It's enough RAM for most anything I've tried. I'm not even sure 32bit XP can effectively use over 2GB. But if I switch to 64bit Win7 how does that change things? Is it that it's faster but hogs more RAM or will 3GB be enough for average use? Thanks. There's no gain if you aren't going to put more memory on the board than XP can use. All there is is a small loss from the fact that 64 bit programs are bigger. |
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