Vista ultimate 64-bit for gaming?

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knobbicus

Limp Gawd
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It turns out I can get Vista Ultimate 64 from my university for $89. Is there any reason not to do this for a gaming system? I'm running XP Pro 32 now, but am building a new box and would like to put Vista on it. The other Vista flavors I can get from the university are Ultimate x32 and Business x32. Is there any reason NOT to get Ultimate x64? I'm hoping to put 4gig RAM in the new box, so it would be nice to go with the x64 version..


Thanks,
knobbicus
 
*waits for the "NO!!!! it will melt yur system"*
i see no reason not to go vista x64 iv been running it for about 10 months now and its been awesome
 
I've been using it almost since release for gaming and it works fine for everything I do. All my machines would be Vista if it weren't for a few applications that didn't work correctly with it.
 
knobbicus said:
Is there any reason NOT to get Ultimate x64?
Click to expand...
Well, you'll miss out on all "Oh my, Vista sucks donkey balls" parties, but aside from that, no, unless you use some very specific software that isn't compatible. If you take a look around here, the vast majority of people who have gone to Vista x64, have stared there, satisfied.
 
Great. Thanks for the replies, everyone. Looks like it's going to be Vista Ultimate 64!
 
yep. concur.

originally went Vista 32, not sure why. Finally, a few months ago I guess, went 64. not looking back. dont know why I didnt go 64 from the get go. everything runs well, I really think 64 is the only version to use, unless your hardware is no good.
 
I was a little nervous to get a 64-bit OS, but everything works fine on it provided you have fairly new hardware and software.
 
Well as long as you have an 8800 or better or a 3850 or better, you'll probably not notice that huge of a performance impact in terms of framerate loss from the xp ---> vista switch.

What you WILL notice is the huge performance increase from additional memory. Vista's memory manager is quite smart and takes advantage of every meg you put in to cache things you often use. With 4 gigs and Vista I've noticed a healthy load speed increase and much less chugging when alt tabbing, loading, and quitting games.

If you're gonna go Vista, might as well go 64 bit.
 
hey Dan and Danny- I'm going to post my new system build specs in the General Hardware forum- I'd appreciate it if you both could have a look and comment. Been following the forums and Newegg pretty closely on this for the past few weeks, and have tried to incorporate comments that you both routinely make regarding choices for parts.

Thanks for the replies to the topic.

-knobbicus
 
I converted to Vista from XP fulltime last summer. I had a lot of hardware that wasn't Vista compatible that I had to change out: printer, TV card, scanner, Joysticks (USB versions for the gameport versions...Vista dumps gameports). Software, especially anti-virus may need to be replaced. Be careful, some, like ZoneAlarm, list Vista compatibility but NOT Vista 64 compatibility. I've been using Vista 32, but I'm testing 64 on a new build. So far, most things are working. Some older games (I have a lot of old wargames) don't like Vista, and some won't work on 64 that do on 32. Some I play in MS Virtual PC 2007 (free download) that I installed XP Pro in. Works very well there without dual boot inconveniences.
 
I've been running Vista 64 for almost one year. I haven't had a single hiccup. Make the change.
 
I'm glad I went with vista 64. Not a problem for about 6 months
 
There is no reason not to. I use it on several gaming systems, and have never been happier. I am a big Vista supported, though, so I am a bit biased. :) I've never had a problem, and love it! All of my software is supported, I think I've had one or two that didn't work, but I was able to download a 64 bit alternative.

Go for it.
 
knobbicus said:
It turns out I can get Vista Ultimate 64 from my university for $89. Is there any reason not to do this for a gaming system? I'm running XP Pro 32 now, but am building a new box and would like to put Vista on it. The other Vista flavors I can get from the university are Ultimate x32 and Business x32. Is there any reason NOT to get Ultimate x64? I'm hoping to put 4gig RAM in the new box, so it would be nice to go with the x64 version..


Thanks,
knobbicus
Click to expand...

Do not go to Vista 64 bit just yet. Drivers have to be signed or will not work. Get WinXP 64 if you can, it's alot more compatible with the software of today. Vista 64 was a huge headache for me.
 
Been on Vista 64 for about year now too, and since the SP1 patch, it has been a lot easier on my day to day. Feels a lot more like XP. But it still comes down to this. Unless you are worried about being able to get into a full 4GB+ of RAM, there is still not much reason to go to 64-bit on a desktop. If you are primarily gaming, I would suggest 32-bit.
 
Yah I've been wanting to make the switch from XP to Vista 64 since I last used Vista Ultimate on my last temporary computer. With my new computer, I can finally run it (look in signature). I want to know though, can I just buy the upgrade seeing that I have XP already or should I buy the full install? I would like to buy it but I want to find cheaper alternatives because $300 for an operating system just seems waaaaaaaaaaaaay to pricey.
 
No real reason not to use 64-bit Vista. The only problem you'll run in to over 32-bit Vista is 16-bit apps. 64-bit Windows (XP or Vista) can't run 16-bit code. So any old DOS or Windows 3.1 game will not run, and need to be run under an emulator (DOSBox, VMWare or VirtualPC work nicely). You also sometimes run in to a 32-bit game that happens to have an old 16-bit installer, Fallout Tactics would be an example. So while it can run, you can't install it, you have to install it in an emulator and then copy it over.

In terms of modern games, you aren't likely to have many problems. I'm sure you'll run in to one once and awhile but for the most part they are things that have Vista problems. Rarely does something run in 32-bit Vista, not in 64-bit.

Now this assumes that you have drivers for 64-bit Vista, so check on that first. Most major hardware does, even a lot of minor hardware, but check first because there's no using XP drivers in 64-bit Vista. Companies I know that do have drivers are:

Intel
nVidia
ATi
Creative Labs
Saitek
Logitech
Microsoft
Edirol (Roland)
Colorvision (Datacolor)

That is by no means a complete list of people who do, just companies that I have hardware from that I've gotten 64-bit Vista drivers for.

So long as there's 64-bit drivers for your hardware, you should be fine.
 
My 2 cents. make sure that you purchase the version that has SP1 already in it....then you can vLite away without having to worry about slipstreaming service packs and all that :)
 
The only software that I've found that does NOT work on Vista x64 is Cisco VPN clients. Apparently Cisco isn't making one.

I tried the Cisco AnyConnect (what was recommended by others) and it didn't work worth a crap.

But other than that, I LOVE Vista x64. Stable and I've not had any issues with it.
 
I just installed vista x64 and it works fine. the only thing is I suffered a major framerate drop in team fortress 2. in xp, it was running everything on high, 8x MSAA and wouldn't drop below 60fps. now I turned it all down and to 4x AA and it goes down to about 20fps in some situations. I don't really know if its a driver issue or what... other than that, it seems alright :)
 
http://www.tomshardware.com/2008/02/15/vista_workshop/
An interesting article that says there is no real benefit to 64 bit unless you go 8 GB of RAM. Feel free to make your own choice, but I have been more pleased with the 32 version of Vista. 32 bit software still has the same limitations on a 64 bit OS, and there is still little 64 bit software out there. I look forward to the day when everything is 64 bit, but for now 32 bit is a better choice for me.
 
xxEIEIOxx said:
http://www.tomshardware.com/2008/02/15/vista_workshop/
An interesting article that says there is no real benefit to 64 bit unless you go 8 GB of RAM. Feel free to make your own choice, but I have been more pleased with the 32 version of Vista. 32 bit software still has the same limitations on a 64 bit OS, and there is still little 64 bit software out there. I look forward to the day when everything is 64 bit, but for now 32 bit is a better choice for me.
Click to expand...

thanks for the article, good read
 
I agree that was a good read. 8 GB of GOOD memory can be had on the cheap now. I went to buy another 2 x 1GB set of Ballistix Tracers and happened upon the PC2 8000 G.Skills at the egg and decided to give 8 GB a shot. Provided my memory controller can handle the load I think 8 Gigs and Vista 64 bit will provide for a nice OS.
 
I was using vista 64bit ultimate for gaming for a while. It ended up crashing hard, and some really odd things started happening. Went back to 64 bit xp and all was fine. I was quick to pass judgment blaming the Os, but it turned out my vid card would cause drivers in Vista 64 to become corrupt.
with a new GTS, I been looking to go back now.

For the few days it worked I enjoyed it the first time around.
 
Another Vista 64 here. I've got 6GB of ram in there, so that helps alot.

With all the ram, vista keeps almost all my programs I run all the time cached in ram, so opening a new internet explorer is as fast as Alt-Tabing into a running one, and COD4 loads instantly, just to name a few.

Ram is cheap so load up on as much as you can. Vista never seems to have to wait on the hard drive to do anything, which makes it very very snappy.
 
Vista 64 rocks, I still dual boot XP cause i have plenty of space for the extra OS but i end up using vista more and more.
 
Danny Bui said:
What applications won't work with Vista 64bit?
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the only program I've used that didn't work with vista was my old school program, but then again it didn't run so well with XP so i have to give vista a break.

other than that, older ATI tool doesn't run with vista, thats about it (its the driver signing thing that stops it). the new beta ATI tool works fine though.

PS: Vista Ultimate X64 here. My uncle has 32 bit vista, but his PC is much slower than mine hardware wise, so i can't compare.
 
If you watch vids with DivX web player (stage6.com) then the post processing won't work. At least not for me. This results in videos looking pixelated and jaggy outside of their original size. This makes me want to go back to XP because I do watch a lot of videos using the DivX web player and they look horrible right now.
 
xxEIEIOxx said:
http://www.tomshardware.com/2008/02/15/vista_workshop/
An interesting article that says there is no real benefit to 64 bit unless you go 8 GB of RAM. Feel free to make your own choice, but I have been more pleased with the 32 version of Vista. 32 bit software still has the same limitations on a 64 bit OS, and there is still little 64 bit software out there. I look forward to the day when everything is 64 bit, but for now 32 bit is a better choice for me.
Click to expand...

The WOW64 part is kind of inaccurate. The WOW64 part is not really an emulator on an x64 processor, but a way to tell the processor to run the specific process as 32-bit code. This is because the x64 processors support a special compatibility mode when it needs to run 32-bit code. However, on other processors such as the IA64, WOW64 is an emulator as it has to translate the 32-bit code into something the IA64 understands. This is why there is little performance difference between 32-bit apps on 32-bit and 64-bit versions of Vista. WOW64 on Windows XP 64-bit should be the same.
 
Blackforge is correct. There's not really any "emulation" that goes on any more than there was when you'd run 16-code in a 32-bit OS, or when you run a 32-bit OS on a 64-bit processor for that matter.

What happens is with x86, it is designed so that everything is fully backward compatible. New modes simply extent and encompass old modes. For example the general purpose registers on the x86 processors are done in such a way that the larger ones encompass the smaller ones. So in long mode (64-bit mode) the general purpose registers are RAX, RBX and so on. Each stores a 64-bit number. However you can still address the 32-bit versions, EAX, EBX and such. They are just the lower half of the 64-bit version, and code that references it works fine. In fact you can access the 16-bit AX, BX, etc and the 8-bit AL, BL, etc.

The net effect is that the older code works just fine on the new processors, even in the new modes. So what WOW64 does is handles interfacing with the 64-bit OS. It does things like map calls to the kernel, and such. It isn't a processor emulator as such a thing isn't needed. It just switches the processor to what's called "compatibility mode" when it executed a 32-bit thread, and then back.

The performance penalty is extremely minimal. I certainly don't notice anything being slower on a 64-bit OS. There is a little bit of overhead associated with switching processor modes and the other mapping that takes place, but it isn't much. A couple percent at most.

Basically, all your 32-bit stuff just runs on 64-bit, and you don't really notice the difference between app types unless you look at task manager or something to see which is which. The hardware and software are both designed to support running 64-bit and 32-bit at the same time in an extremely transparent manner.
 
I am going to upgrade to the 32 bit version of vista because I won't get more than the 2GB RAM and my hardware isn't so modern.
 
Gabriel said:
I am going to upgrade to the 32 bit version of vista because I won't get more than the 2GB RAM and my hardware isn't so modern.
Click to expand...

I'd recommend against it, I had a similar setup as you and I felt vista was much slower than XP, but on my core2 duo vista64 runs pretty fast even with 2gb. Then again YMMV.
 
I wouldn't personally upgrade an XP machine to a Vista machine unless there are specific things in Vista that you want. Although Vista certainly has more features than XP, most of them aren't essential, and I'd be more inclined to save the money unless you have a particular reason to upgrade.
 
thanks for the comments everyone-

my interest in vista is a for a completely new build. I'll be putting 4GB in it, and that was one reason to go with 64bit. i'd like to move to vista, since I have the money to spend on vista now, and it will certainly be the de facto standard in a couple years. it sounds like the comments are generally split between 64 and 32-bit. i may simply go with 32bit now, with the understanding that i'll only be seeing ~3.5GB of my RAM, and during the coming months perhaps 64bit drivers will mature. i'd rather suffer a loss of ram and save what sounds like some potential massive headaches.

any additional comments are welcome.
thanks!
knobbicus
 
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