64 or 32 bit? Which to install?

Question

Hi,
My laptop has a turion 64x2 processor. What are the pros and cons of installing an x64 build rather than the standard 32 bit? What would you recommend?

Answer 1

Jupp, memory is one thing. And for me the other one is: unless you're a perfectionist that can't stand the thought of using 32-bit on a machine that supports 64 - take 32 - that's just reasonable!
I think noone really ever noticed huge performance advantages when using 64 (<4GB)... mostly more like barely noticeable and/or entirely imaginative performance advantages (or can anyone that isn't using repeated benchmarking tell for sure? *g*).
But some things that don't work that well can be found in the wiki & forum (search '64' etc) and also there might be "random annoying stuff" like:
- pixma printer addons to see ink left etc. (closed-source) only available for 32bit, noone cares enough to figure out how to make it run 64
- bin32-nvidia version temporarily out of sync with nvidia version (and thus not working)
- google-maps or wine not working for 2 days, you'll never find out why
- virtualbox not working for some time unless you change some of the source every time before compiling the kernel module
...etc...
Nothing really vital though, and even if you want to install 64 just because you can and want to (which is all by itself not as bad a reason as it sounds at first, at least if you're stubborn enough about it ) - well, maybe you won't even experience any difficulties... just try. I'm not reasonable, I want 64bit! It's double the amount of bits that 32 bits has! Can't let that go to waste, all those bits. I paid for them and I'm gonna use them! MY LINUX HAS MORE BIT THAN YOURS!!!1111
(edit: anybody else been wishing for a C128 every Christmas since it got out and never got one? I wonder if there's a support group or something for this... *g*)
Last edited by whoops (2009-06-25 16:45:16)