Hello everyone, I currently have 4GB of RAM installed on my computer (and 512MB VRAM). My question is wether an upgrade to 64 bit would result in a significnat performance gain? (and what are the downsides of upgrading from 32 to 64 bit?)
I think 32-bit only supports up to 3.5GB, so you'll "get" an extra 512MB ram.
I had no problems upgrading to 64-bit, but you should probably check that drivers you need have 64-bit versions. And you need to check your PC is 64-bit, though I'd bet it is. (I think if right click Computer, open properties, click on the Windows Experience Index, click View and print detailed information, and the under the top group (system information) it should ahve soemthing like "64-bit capable? Yes", I know this was there in Vista, but I have 64-bit Windows 7 so it's probably hidden for me.)
Jonathan
well, my computer is 64bit capable and a 32bit version of 7 can only adress 3GB (maybe 3,5GB with VRAM included) as far as I know. Also does upgrading to 64bit require a complete reinstall of my OS or can I just upgrade my 32bit 7 Home Premium to 64bit?
I'm pretty sure you'd have to do a complete reinstall. It probably be safer/better anyway.
nope... you would need complete reinstall from ground up.
Also as already have been mentioned you definitely need to check drivers availability. Some of the vendors (Sony most notably) have a policy of limiting customer's choices. Many of the 64bit capable Sony Vaio Laptops (equipped with 64bit CPUs) are specially designed in a way as to make them incompatible with the drivers from parts manufacturers. What it means is that although your Laptop may have nVidia graphics card the driver from nVidia will not work with it. It would HAVE to be from Sony. And Sony simply refuse to supply such. I guess this is done in order to fragment market and enable Sony to charge premium prices for no other good reason.
Long story short make sure that all essential (at least) drivers will be available to you in 64bit format.
All in all 64bit system in addition to the access to the greater amount of ram is also more stable. Some memory intensive applications run noticeably faster too even when they are within the 3Gb limit of 32 bit version - for instance #ds Max and Photoshop (both programs must be 64bit version , just like OS itself)
well I guess the only problem now ill be raising the money to buy a 64bit version of 7 ()sad()
The windows 7 boxes come with both 32-bit and 64-bit install discs.
You should be able to use the 64-bit to go straight from 32-bit to 64-bit, even if you have the upgrade version.
As you have bought the license you can use that on both 64-bit and 32-bit discs.
well, not really. My upgrade disc shipped with only a 32 bit version of 7 there was no 64bit version on it. I checked it. I don't know if the fact that my upgrade version was sent to me by Acer plays a role.
Well you should return it, because they are meant to ship with both discs, and then buy an upgrade disc from somewhere else. (unless you got the upgrade for free)
well I got the the upgrade for free-ish (just had to pay €15 for delivering it at my house)
Seeing as you legally own a license for windows 7 (I would have said paid for one but you didn't :) )you should be able to get a 64-bit disc from someone and just use that.
But I'm not 100% on the legality of it.
hmm, thing is, I don't know anyone (not in RL atleast) that has a 64 bit installation disc for windows 7. So I guess I'll have to buy it (Never tought that I would buy something made by Microsoft)
I'll repeat my post from Simtropolis.. still equally true re: memory addressing
If you can recognize only 3.5GB of memory it is a limit of your motherboard hardware, not the OS
Per microsoft:
Memory Support and Windows Operating Systems
Updated: February 9, 2005
QuoteOperating systems based on Microsoft Windows NT technologies have always provided applications with a flat 32-bit virtual address space that describes 4 gigabytes (GB) of virtual memory. The address space is usually split so that 2 GB of address space is directly accessible to the application and the other 2 GB is only accessible to the Windows executive software.
The 32-bit versions of the Windows 2000 Advanced Server and Windows NT Server 4.0, Enterprise Edition, operating systems were the first versions of Windows to provide applications with a 3-GB flat virtual address space, with the kernel and executive components using only 1 GB. In response to customer requests, Microsoft has expanded the availability of this support to the 32-bit version of Windows XP Professional and all 32-bit versions of Windows Server 2003.
Windows 2000 Memory Support. With Windows 2000 Professional and Server, the maximum amount of memory that can be supported is 4 GB (identical to Windows NT 4.0, as described later in this section). However, Windows 2000 Advanced Server supports 8 GB of physical RAM and Windows 2000 Datacenter Server supports 32 GB of physical RAM using the PAE feature of the IA-32 processor family, beginning with Intel Pentium Pro and later.
Windows XP Professional and Windows Server 2003 Memory Support. The maximum amount of memory that can be supported on Windows XP Professional and Windows Server 2003 is also 4 GB. However, Windows Server 2003, Enterprise Edition supports 32 GB of physical RAM and Windows Server 2003, Datacenter Edition supports 64 GB of physical RAM using the PAE feature.
Plus the following, since I'm sure some wonder
Here's the official answer from Microsoft:
Quote32-bit versions of Windows Vista Home Basic, Home Premium, Business, Enterprise, and Ultimate: 4GB
32-bit Windows Vista Starter: 1GB
64-bit versions of Windows Vista Home Basic: 8GB
64-bit versions of Windows Vista Home Premium: 16GB
64-bit versions of Windows Vista Business, Enterprise, and Ultimate: 128GB
Of course none of these things address the fact that the hardware must allocate space for running address lines and bus addresses, etc.. this is why many motherboards use some of that space for hardware addressing and therefore you don't have the full memory space that you theoritically COULD access. Some motherboards impliment their own registers for this, so they may allow the full range.. so your milage may vary :)
So truth is for each person and his system, I'd say refer to the motherboard manual or the system documentation.
Sorry I don't have the table for Win7 but I strongly suspect it follows the Vista guide.
Also, the RAM needs to be properly organized in the motherboard slots - each slot will have a small number next to it, from 1 to 4 if your motherboard has 4 RAM slots (mine, sadly, has only 2) - put the RAM card with the MOST capacity in SLOT 1. From there, order them in decreasing capacity.
The motherboard identifies the capacity of the RAM in Slot 1 and assumes that no other slot has any more capacity, so if you have a 64MB in slot 1, but a 2GB in slot 2, your computer can only use 128MB of RAM.
That works the same way with any type of motherboard (or at least that's what I'm taught in my computer hardware class), regardless of your OS, BIOS or other hardware.
In Windows 7 32-bit, you can do something to make it support over 3,2GB of memory. :D
could you please tell me how to do that? As stated before, I have 4GB of RAM istalled (2x2GB) I'm running 7 Home Premium 32bit and it only recognises 3 out of the 4GB of physical RAM
Unfortunately, it depends on your hardware configuration. 32 bit Windows versions can address up to 4 GB RAM, but please keep in mind that your graphics card also has RAM, and some other components use a small address range as well. Some mainboards are capable of "shifting" the RAM addresses that the hardware is using above the 4 GB limit, so you have more addresses for Windows, but if yours isn't capable of that, you're out of luck. Here's some more information about the problem: http://www.ocmodshop.com/ocmodshop.aspx?a=989
First of all, this is something totally unrelated to the whole 64bit thing. But I did not see the pàoint in opening a new topic about this so I put it here. Anyway the problem is that in some games (Left 4 Dead 1 and 2, FSX and Borlderlands) My sound somtimes becomes totally distorted and my game starts to lag. It should be noted that this is a random-ish issue. It happens at random times is all of the above games (except for FSX), so I don't think it's a CPU overload. Except in FSX where it happens when the ATC gives instructions. I don't think it's a faulty audio driver as well, because it does not happen in other games and when watching films or lstening to music. Also this issue did not appear in FSX until I upgraded to Windows 7. I also have the impression it has gotten worse since I upgraded to windows 7.
Quote from: WC_EEND on November 29, 2009, 04:43:15 AM
Anyway the problem is that in some games (Left 4 Dead 1 and 2, FSX and Borlderlands) My sound somtimes becomes totally distorted and my game starts to lag.
Shouldn't you be studying for your exams? ::) :D
Yes, but posting this only takes 5-ish minutes doesn't it :D
EDIT: could the above described issue be caused by HDD fragmentation?