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Hardware and Windows Vista Hardware issues in relation to Windows Vista. (microsoft.public.windows.vista.hardware_devices) |
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Speed differences between 32-bit and 64-bit Vista?
Some comments and observations after reading through this thread:
1. most desktop applications (including those that are built to use 64 bit hardware) will not benefit very much if at all from the larger virtual or real address space available in 64 bit Windows. Most such applications typically use considerably less than 1 GB of address space anyway (use Task Manager, or Performance Monitor to verify this for yourself) so the larger virtual address space available is not relevant to them. 2. most desktop users don't have more than 4 GB of RAM, so having the "ability" (in the OS) to support more won't be relevant to them. This will change over time, but there a quite a few "current product" (desktop) motherboards that support a maximum of 4 GB RAM or less anyway. I agree that the "average" or "typical" RAM complement in desktops and laptops is bound to increase as times go by, but it will be a while before most "typical" users will benefit from more than 4 GB RAM. 3. The larger registers (word size) used in 64 bit processors will be of most benefit, speed wise, to applications that perform a large number of high precision arithmetic operations or otherwise are designed to use the larger registers, such as scientific data modeling, high performance games and image processing. The "Panorama Factory" mentioned in some of the posts is one such application. Typical desktop applications (e.g. word processors) will most likely not benefit appreciably from being re-built (re-compiled) to use 64 bit instructions because of the byte (character) oriented nature of their processes. Some current Intel and presumably AMD or other processors do have specific instructions for performing multiple byte oriented operations concurrently which may also provide a speed boost for applications built (compiled) for 64 bit operation - for more information about this stuff, see for example ftp://download.intel.com/technology/...ions-paper.pdf) - keep in mind that applications have to be specifically coded (or built with a development tool that knows how to use them) to use these "enhanced" instructions to actually benefit from these architectural "advances". 4. 64 bit operating systems will, generally speaking, require more RAM to support the same workload than 32 bit operating systems. This is because the data structures used by the OS to manage virtual memory, processes etc. have larger "rows" (e.g. 8 bytes instead of 4 bytes per "item"). The impact of this will increase as the number of processes increases (for example in a Terminal Server supporting a large number of users). Switching from 32 bit to 64 bit OS for such systems may be actually reduce performance unless there is sufficient RAM in the hardware. If the hardware is RAM rich (e.g. 16 GB or more), then the additional real memory capacity will help such systems to support higher loads if they are memory constrained on 32 bit systems. 5. Applications (systems) that can benefit from lots of virtual address space and lots of RAM (e.g. database management, mail servers, search engines etc.) can really take advantage of 64 bit systems because of the much larger virtual address spaces available per process and the increased maximum RAM supported by the hardware and the operating system. Systems used to support multiple Virtual Machines will benefit from more RAM. Keep in mind that 32 bit Windows servers can use more than 4 GB of RAM quite effectively using Processor Address Extensions (the PAE option), so 64 bit Windows is not a pre-requisite for this, although it may be advantageous. Be aware that there are no currently available processors or operating systems in the "Windows/Intel" line that actually implement a full 64 bit real or virtual address space. See http://members.shaw.ca/bsanders/Wind...eEtc.htm#64Bit for more information about this. 6. 64 bit Windows is still relatively new, particularly so in the desktop (client) market. This means that there is lots of hardware for which there are no 64 bit drivers yet. Some "older" (the meaning of "older" is subjective - different vendors interpret it differently!) will never have drivers for 64 bit Windows. So, just as when Windows 2000 and later Windows XP was released, early adopters often find their existing (and newly purchased) hardware is "not supported". 7. the bottleneck in many cases is disk access, not processor or memory speed or capacity. Additional RAM can help to provide optimization of directory and file caching, but the only solution to the disk bottleneck is more physical disks (e.g. using "spanning") or disks, controllers and chipsets with higher data transfer rates. Two conclusions: A. 64 bit system overall is not necessarily "faster" or more responsive than a 32 bit system on the same or equivalent hardware. In some cases (when RAM is in short supply), 64 bit system may be slower or have less capacity. B. if you are prepared to deal with frustration, search for drivers, interact (often with little success) with vendor support organizations, and want to be on the leading (bleeding?) edge, then by all means use 64 bit Windows. On the other hand if you just want your system, peripherals (e.g. scanners, printers or whatever) to work "out of the box" without hassles, for the time being at least, stick to 32 bit Windows. C. Generally and for "typical" uses, don't expect any big difference in performance with 64 bit over 32 bit Windows. -- Bruce Sanderson MVP Printing http://members.shaw.ca/bsanders It is perfectly useless to know the right answer to the wrong question. "Phillip Pi" wrote in message ... Hi. Since I installed both 32-bit and 64-bit Vista Ultimate Edition on my old test machine (ASUS K8V SE Deluxe, Athlon 64 3200+ [754 CPU], 512 MB of RAM, SATA HDD, etc.), I notice the speeds are identical. I can't see and feel any improvements. I did install the ATI Radeon 9600 AIW drivers to help the video speed, but I just don't see the speed differences. Am I expecting too much or missing something? I don't have any other program installed so far. It's just a bare Vista with the latest ATI/AMD video drivers from ati.com/amd.com. Thank you in advance. -- Phillip Pi Senior Software Quality Assurance Analyst ISP/Symantec Online Services, Consumer Business Unit Symantec Corporation www.symantec.com ----------------------------------------------------- Email: YMC (remove SYMC to reply by e-mail) ----------------------------------------------------- Please do NOT e-mail me for technical support. DISCLAIMER: The views expressed in this posting are mine, and do not necessarily reflect the views of my employer. Thank you. |
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Speed differences between 32-bit and 64-bit Vista?
For Windows guest OS, Processor based hardware virtualization (VT for Intel,
and AMD-V for AMD) really only seem to benefit during the installation process. Once the VM additions are installed into the guest, it does in software what the CPU was doing in hardware. Hardware based you would think would be faster, but numerous reports are that it's about the same. Bottom line - Hardware virtualization cuts about an hour off of a Vista guest installation but it's not noticeable after the VM additions are installed. "Lang Murphy" wrote in message ... yeah... not too "with it" on hw virtualization... guess I will be soon enough... |
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Speed differences between 32-bit and 64-bit Vista?
Thanks for the feedback... look forward to checking out the HW
virtualization at any rate... Lang "LaRoux" wrote in message ... For Windows guest OS, Processor based hardware virtualization (VT for Intel, and AMD-V for AMD) really only seem to benefit during the installation process. Once the VM additions are installed into the guest, it does in software what the CPU was doing in hardware. Hardware based you would think would be faster, but numerous reports are that it's about the same. Bottom line - Hardware virtualization cuts about an hour off of a Vista guest installation but it's not noticeable after the VM additions are installed. "Lang Murphy" wrote in message ... yeah... not too "with it" on hw virtualization... guess I will be soon enough... |
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