Gaming with Vista, 64 bit or 32 bit?

C

Chris Lakies

Limp Gawd
Joined
Feb 17, 2005
Messages
395
Hi just wondering,

If i got the 64 bit version could i still play 32 bit version games or use 32 bit software?
 
Call me grouchy, but why would you buy the 64 bit version of an OS, without knowing if any of your software would run on it? I'm absolutely amazed at the number of times this question is asked.

Okay, now that I feel better, yes, you will be able to run your 32 bit software, assuming it's compatible with Vista. You will, however, need 64 bit drivers for all of your hardware, which you should check into before installing.
 
djnes said:
Okay, now that I feel better, yes, you will be able to run your 32 bit software, assuming it's compatible with Vista.
Click to expand...

More or less. Now, if the 32-bit software does anything kernel-related or if it relies on some 16-bit subprocess, it may not work. (I've had a few things crash and burn, and even got a BSOD from Tiger Woods 2007, in 64-bit Vista, when they worked fine in 32-bit land.)
 
djnes said:
Call me grouchy, but why would you buy the 64 bit version of an OS, without knowing if any of your software would run on it? I'm absolutely amazed at the number of times this question is asked.
Click to expand...
no shit. that and everyone thinking they wont be able to play games unless they have a dx10 gpu. most dont even multitask or use windows so a duel core cpu is absolutely needed, they game

:rolleyes:
 
Hey guys, chill. He hasn't bought it yet, he's checking before he buys. He's making an effort to find out if his apps run on 64bit.
 
First off, I have the 64bit version of Vista Ultimate running on the rig in my signature.

Second, yes, most games should run provided you have 64 bit drivers for them. Now, there have been two games I've run into that won't work currently in Vista 64. One is Gothic 3, and the other is a demo call SilverFall. Both are limited due to the copy protection scheme these games use with regards to loading an unsigned driver. Vista will block these games from installing the driver when you go to launch the game, and the game will never start.

Call me grouchy, but why would you buy the 64 bit version of an OS, without knowing if any of your software would run on it?
Click to expand...
I believe this is why he is asking before he makes the decision for 32 vs 64 bit. Call it future proofing.
 
well ultimate comes with both 32 and 64, so installed 32 first, then when needed, install 64
 
Installed X64 Ultimate. All my games working fine, Company of Heroes, HL2, BF2, Oblivion, and even Doom 3.

Most games will work because vista will just run them in X84 mode.
 
Stupac said:
Installed X64 Ultimate. All my games working fine, Company of Heroes, HL2, BF2, Oblivion, and even Doom 3.

Most games will work because vista will just run them in X84 mode.
Click to expand...


How have you found the performance level of the 64 bit version?
 
Instead of saying its 64 bit vista so the games won't work, why not just list all the games that have been tested that do work.

TESTED

- Half Life 2 & Counter Strike: Source
- Company of Heroes
- World of Warcraft


And if the game is crap, don't bother listing here :eek:

Ok so the ones i listed are popular good games that do work, but theres one thing we all can agree on and thats driver improvements for fps etc :/
 
Thanks everyone for you feedback. I will probably go toward the path of 64 bit or the Ultamate addition.

Not sure if Crysis will be 32 or 64 bit but i really just wanted Vista for DX10.........
 
Well think of it this way.

To play Direct X 10 games, you need 2 things.

A direct x 10 graphics card *Nvidia 8800 gtx & gts so far...

and Windows Vista operating system

So since its for the new os i'd think they'd get it 64 bit compatible too :D

Here i found out some info for you

Crysis will be Crytek's second game, after 2004's acclaimed Far Cry, and the company is aiming to ratchet up its storytelling, as well as its technologies. The story revolves around an alien invasion of Earth, with the end of humanity as we know it hanging in the balance. This is a far cry from Far Cry's tale of science run amok on a remote tropical island. Still, Crysis does feature a tropical island, and it serves as the setting for the game. After a mysterious meteor crashes on the island, your special forces team is deployed to investigate. However, the North Koreans have arrived first, so you'll battle not only them but also the aliens, once the extraterrestrial threat is revealed. The early screenshots and videos of Crysis are no doubt impressive and, in some ways, jaw dropping. They show combat taking place in an incredibly realized tropical paradise. More importantly, the videos show things that have never been seen before in a game, such as how the individual leaves of a plant will bend if someone or something passes by. "We tried to make everything more cinematic and more realistic," said Cevat Yerli, Crytek president and CEO.

Crytek has always been a company on the cutting edge. As we noted in our prior preview, Crytek's roots are in developing one of the first tech demos for Nvidia's GeForce graphics cards, and the company has been working with shaders and other advanced graphics features as long as anyone in the industry. Yet just as important is how the development team works together to solve technical and artistic issues.

"Our technology team works very closely with our production team, so they are not only aware of what the future is, but they all understand what is the real dilemma of pipelines, tools, and production issues," Yerli said. For example, members of the technology team are often assigned temporarily to the production side of the office, where they can work closely together to solve issues that crop up during development. The company also does a lot of internal training, workshops, tutorials, and videos to get everyone up to speed on the latest technology. "Technology is one thing," Yerli said, "but to get the team to understand technology is another."

Crysis will let Crytek show off everything that it's been working on over the past two years. The game will feature not only state-of-the-art graphics, but also advanced physics, animation, lighting, and more. A lot of the technology incorporated into Crysis is aimed at increasing the cinematic nature of the experience, as well as creating more realistic gameplay. For instance, with deformable vegetation, it will be possible to see leaves bend and sway. The movement of foliage in the distance may reveal an otherwise undetected enemy. All objects will have physical properties that can change drastically throughout the story. The tropical jungle, for instance, will flash freeze, and suddenly everything in the frozen environment will shatter apart.

Yerli explained the full range of visual tools that Crytek is working with. Crysis' camera technology will make extensive use of motion blur, so if you spin around quickly to face an enemy, the images onscreen will blur. The lighting system makes use of depth of field so that if you focus on an object nearby, objects in the distance will blur. The game uses a new indirect lighting system that tries to model the way light and color react in the real world. Lights will "bounce" off of colors and interact to create more lifelike lighting conditions. And, of course, Crysis will take advantage of high dynamic range lighting to create more realistic light, in general.

Crytek will do something very interesting with color, as well. "We manipulate color depending on the intensity," Yerli said. So if you're in an action-packed situation, the colors in the game may become grittier or more saturated to reflect that adrenalin is flowing through your system and your senses are more alive.


Fortunately for this vehicle, DirectX 10 isn't here yet.

Yerli was able to give us an idea of what kind of hardware Crysis will support. Keep in mind that these are by no means the official requirements, as the game is still in development. Still, this gives us an idea of what kind of technologies the game will take advantage of, and it may give you an idea of where you currently stand in terms of being able to run the game.

"Crysis will feature out-of-the-box 32-bit, 64-bit, DirectX 9, DirectX 10, and multithreading support," he said. That's a lot of technical jargon, so we'll go over each point one by one. The important thing to keep in mind is that you won't have to worry about configuring all of these settings when you install the game, as Crysis will automatically configure itself based on what kind of hardware you have.

Crysis Under the Hood
DirectX is Microsoft's application programming interface for games. That's a fancy way of saying that DirectX basically lets game developers easily take advantage of the latest developments in graphics technology. Most gamers will play Crysis using DirectX 9 video cards, since DX 9 has been the standard for several years and there is a wide install base of DirectX 9-capable video cards. If you have an older video card that doesn't support DirectX 9, though, it looks like you are going to need to upgrade, as Yerli said that the game will require a DirectX 9 graphics card with support for shader model 2.0. (Shaders are basically programmable instructions in the graphics card that help determine the visual qualities of an image.)

Since DirectX 10 cards didn't exist in May, the Crysis demo at the Electronic Entertainment Expo was actually running on DirectX 9 video cards, which is a good indication of what sorts of visuals you'll get with current hardware. "The E3 demo was all about DX 9 shader model 2.0--there was no more technology than this," Yerli said. He also addressed some of the controversy around the E3 demo. While visually amazing, the frame rate struggled quite a bit throughout the demo. However, he noted that Crysis was running on dual graphics-processor-unit systems, while most other PC games at the show were running on quad GPU systems. Still, we can expect performance on DirectX 9 cards to be smoother once the game is finished and optimized.

Of course, if you want the game to look the absolute finest, you'll need DirectX 10 hardware. It's a bit hard to get DirectX 10 cards right now, though, since they're not on the market, but the first cards should be out by the time Crysis ships. What sort of difference will DirectX 10 provide? Judging from what we've seen, DirectX 10 visuals elevate the graphics from beautiful to absolutely cutting edge. Subtle effects that really help immerse you into the game's world are only really possible with DirectX 10. However, to take advantage of DirectX 10, you'll also need Windows Vista, the long-awaited successor to Windows XP. That's due to the fact that the DirectX 10 API will only be released with Windows Vista, since Microsoft has basically rewritten the decade-old DirectX technology from scratch to take advantage of Vista's new driver model.

What's interesting is that Yerli told us that if you have Windows Vista and an older DirectX 9 card, you should still see better performance with Windows Vista than Windows XP, even if the hardware remains unchanged. "DirectX 9 on Vista will run faster throughout due to the better device driver model...which is a great thing because just upgrading the operating system on the same rig, you get a better gaming experience," he said.

In addition to your graphics card, Crysis will most likely make maximum work out of whatever CPU you have. The game will run fine on current, single-core CPUs, but it will take advantage of the latest multicore CPUs, as well. Yes, that means Crysis is multithreaded, which means that it can make maximum use out of dual-core systems. Where's all that processing power going? Well, part of the CPU's time will be taken up by Crytek's proprietary physics engine (called CryPhysics, of course), and it's the reason why you'll be able to saw apart trees with gunfire and why vegetation will bend and deform when someone passes by--or when the force of explosions blow them back.

Crysis will also take advantage of 64-bit CPUs. Crytek has had experience working with new technology, since it released a patch for Far Cry last year to take advantage of the new 64-bit processors from AMD and Intel. However, while 64-bit usually doesn't bring any measurable performance increase in games (most games just take advantage of 64-bit's larger memory space), it appears that it will provide better performance in Crysis. According to Yerli, the 64-bit version "will bring a performance difference of up to 10 to 15 percent on each thread" compared to the 32-bit version.

Put this all together, and it makes sense that if you want the ultimate Crysis experience, you'll need hardware that's not even available today. However, Yerli explained that Crytek's philosophy is to make sure that existing systems aren't left far behind. "The rule of development of Crysis has been by the time we ship, the game will scale back two years," he said. So, when the game is released, you might want to examine your machine and figure out if any of the components are older than two years. If so, you'll probably want to upgrade them.

All this new technology is daunting, but it seems fitting, as well. Microsoft chose to show off Crysis during its E3 press conference for a reason. Crysis will help usher in a new wave of PC gaming with its DirectX 10 support, but it doesn't forget about today's gamers and their hardware. This promises to be a game that you will want to show off to your friends when it ships sometime this winter.
Click to expand...

Sources:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crysis

http://www.gamespot.com/pc/action/crysis/news.html?sid=6154899



Good old memories of Farcry. That was really a big spear head. After that game everyone expected that standard of graphics :] and now it's part 2 !!!
 
i wonder how sound is going to work with Vista? the whole hardware acceleration and creative debacle
 
Well i'm using vista 64 bit ultimate and i got a creative audigy 2 zs.

This is the latest driver i am using

Creative Sound Blaster Audigy Series Vista Beta Driver 2.12.0001 *released 12 Jan 07

http://ccfiles.creative.com/manualdn/Drivers/AVP/9988/0xD6D47C80/SBAX_PCDVTBETA_US_2_12_0001.exe

Known issues:

* Applications from the original Sound Blaster Audigy CD will not work with this download.
* Users are advised to use Audio Console included in this download to change speaker configurations.
* This driver does not support the following:
o Decoding of Dolby® Digital and DTS™ signals
o DVD-Audio
o DirectSound®-based EAX games
o Gameports
o 6.1 speaker mode.
* SPDIF passthrough is supported on Vista 32-bit only.
Click to expand...


:/ there some vista driver short comings for software so got to wait a while till they release better drivers. But Creative is known for sucking at their drivers so... :(

Anyway i'm using a 5.1 surround sound setup and i play music, videos and games just fine with this driver so ;/ *shrug
 
Especially the DirectSound based EAX games not working is a joke.

For a manufacturer that invented EAX and advertises it's superiority in terms of performance and sound in games, that statement is ridiculous.
 
The one weak spot as far as drivers are concerned continues to be audio and video drivers, but that too has been improving. We'll take a look at later with our benchmarks of Vista, but video performance is much closer to that of Windows XP compared to our first look at Vista, at least as far as DirectX 9 titles go. DirectX 10 and OpenGL are not as clear as there are no DirectX 10 games (and they will require Vista regardless) and AMD is still working the kinks out of their new OpenGL driver for Vista. For audio, earlier concerns about the new audio stack breaking older games has been partially resolved as Creative Labs has released a DirectSound3D-to-OpenAL wrapper that works with some games, showcasing that it's possible to work around the stack changes.
Click to expand...

*Source: http://www.anandtech.com/systems/showdoc.aspx?i=2917
 
That information above about being ready for 64bit sounds so noob.

This line in particular:

However, while 64-bit usually doesn't bring any measurable performance increase in games (most games just take advantage of 64-bit's larger memory space), it appears that it will provide better performance in Crysis.
Click to expand...

Umm. What games actually have 64bit binaries?? The original FarCry did. Its a known fact you gain a lot of performance by having something compiled in a 64bit version. Sounds like whoever said that, doesn't undersatnd the difference between a 32bit binary and a 64bit binary running in a 64bit environment.

Anyway.
 
Only because it's compiled to 64bit, it's not automatically and magically faster/better.

HL2 is available in 64bit and has no performance advantage whatsoever.
 
ScYcS said:
Especially the DirectSound based EAX games not working is a joke.

For a manufacturer that invented EAX and advertises it's superiority in terms of performance and sound in games, that statement is ridiculous.
Click to expand...

As pointed out, you can't have directsound EAX anymore. Directsound is all software based now. Nothing creative can do about that aside from getting developers to start using openAL.
 
I just switched my games over to my x64 system the other day and was surprised at how well it ran.

The system:
AMD64 2500+ CPU
GeForce 7800gt 256mb
Audigy2 sound
2gig RAM
Vista x64

I've been playing Vanguard, which tends to crash alot and have other memory leak issues, in my XP and Vista 32bit systems it crashed quite a bit. In x64 it has not crashed even once and the FPS is about the same or better than in x32.

EQ2 also runs very well in x64. I havent yet tried my other games but these 2 games tend to put a heck of a strain on the system so I'd say they are a decent test.
 
Archer75 said:
As pointed out, you can't have directsound EAX anymore. Directsound is all software based now. Nothing creative can do about that aside from getting developers to start using openAL.
Click to expand...

i'm glad MS did this.. no more being forced to by creative because of EAX.. now, hopefully all games will sound the same with any sound card.
 
mjz_5 said:
i'm glad MS did this.. no more being forced to by creative because of EAX.. now, hopefully all games will sound the same with any sound card.
Click to expand...

So you want crappy sounding software accelerated sound? No cool effects at all? Why don't we just get rid of video cards too and make it all software based.

The only difference is now games will go with openAL and we will then have full hardware acceleration on creative cards. So this doesn't change all that much.
 
Archer75 said:
So you want crappy sounding software accelerated sound? No cool effects at all? Why don't we just get rid of video cards too and make it all software based.

The only difference is now games will go with openAL and we will then have full hardware acceleration on creative cards. So this doesn't change all that much.
Click to expand...

HD acceleration would be nice.. but those EAX effects, why couldn't they not be done in software or openAL and whatnot
 
mjz_5 said:
HD acceleration would be nice.. but those EAX effects, why couldn't they not be done in software or openAL and whatnot
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Because they require hardware acceleration which has been disabled in direct sound in vista. Software doesn't have the power to do it. It needs hardware.

Games using openal aren't affected at all and get full affects and hardware acceleration using soundblaster cards.
 
I have found the compatibility to be very good so far in Vista X64. No problems in a bunch of games and apps.

You got Nvidia, ATI, and creative (beta) out now for drivers.

It seems like so far, when a company releases a driver they release 32 and 64bit versions. Good start except for some of the beta versions.
 
Ok my next question is i currently have Windows XP home edition installed on my machine.

When i buy vista Ultamate can i just buy the upgrade ($259.00) version and install it?
 
Should be fine - you can either do an upgrade installation from within Windows (keeping all of your files, programs, etc.) or a clean installation, wiping the slate clean. The latter would be more stable, the former takes longer but if it works is less disruptive.
 
LhasaCM said:
Should be fine - you can either do an upgrade installation from within Windows (keeping all of your files, programs, etc.) or a clean installation, wiping the slate clean. The latter would be more stable, the former takes longer but if it works is less disruptive.
Click to expand...

Ok cool thanks.

Also i'm running raid. I have a new 64 bit raid version for Vista from Gigabyte the one that you copy to a 3.5" floppy and install prior to the OS install. How will this work if you do a upgrade in place?
 
LhasaCM said:
Should be fine - you can either do an upgrade installation from within Windows (keeping all of your files, programs, etc.) or a clean installation, wiping the slate clean. The latter would be more stable, the former takes longer but if it works is less disruptive.
Click to expand...

Note that when using the "clean install" methodology it's still not a true clean install: the previous OS must be on the drive before the upgrading install happens. After it's complete, you'll have the new installation of Vista on the drive, and there will be a folder named Windows.old in the root directory.

That folder contains the old installation of Windows, all of it. If you're satisfied with Vista - and there's no need to activate it immediately after you install it because you've got 30 days to make up your mind about it, somewhat - you can delete that Windows.old folder and then do a thorough defrag of the drive to bring everything into order.

Again, after you get Vista installed, you do not need to activate it immediately and this is done for a good reason. Microsoft is giving people a 30 day "grace period" sorta to try out Vista on their current hardware - but it's not a 'trial version' of Vista. The purpose is in case you discover a piece or several pieces of hardware that either don't support Vista yet or never will.

If you do discover such issues, and you haven't activated your Vista Product Key yet, you're in good shape because you can then alter the hardware if necessary so you do get a fully Vista ready working system.

But if you activate that Product Key, and then afterwards discover some kind of issues, you're effectively pooched because you'll need to contact Microsoft if - and to make sure anyone reading this understands how big an if this is, I'll make it bigger...

IF

the hardware changes were sufficient enough to trigger a need to reactivate. Typically the only part of hardware that automagically would trigger such a reactivation is the motherboard itself. Most of the "minor" components: RAM, CPU (believe it or not), hard drives, etc, won't trigger it.

So, install it, play around with it, but don't activate it until you're 100% confident your hardware is fully compatible, that you're getting the performance you'd hoped for or at least expected (and Vista is slower than XP after the install, it takes a few days for Vista to self-tune itself and really start to fly), etc.

Good luck...
 
Chris Lakies said:
Ok cool thanks.

Also i'm running raid. I have a new 64 bit raid version for Vista from Gigabyte the one that you copy to a 3.5" floppy and install prior to the OS install. How will this work if you do a upgrade in place?
Click to expand...

Well, you can not 'upgrade' to the 64 bit version of Vista, it requires a clean install. (unsure if it still requires a clean install if you have win xp 64bit).. If you are using Vista 64 - you need to reboot, have it boot off the CD and it will basically perform a new install. It did not ask me to insert my old XP CD or anything, and installed fine.

I am running my OS driver seperatly, and 2 drives in RAID 0 on my ASUS p5wd2-e premium motherboard and I did not have to do anything to see that drive. Even in setup my RAID drive was available.
 
Danith said:
Well, you can not 'upgrade' to the 64 bit version of Vista, it requires a clean install. (unsure if it still requires a clean install if you have win xp 64bit).. If you are using Vista 64 - you need to reboot, have it boot off the CD and it will basically perform a new install. It did not ask me to insert my old XP CD or anything, and installed fine.

I am running my OS driver seperatly, and 2 drives in RAID 0 on my ASUS p5wd2-e premium motherboard and I did not have to do anything to see that drive. Even in setup my RAID drive was available.
Click to expand...


So i may not have to install a raid driver?
 
The only way to know is to start the installation process.

Put in the Vista DVD whenever you're ready, and get started. But don't use the key just yet. When it asks for a key, click No. On the box that pops up, click No again, then you'll be presented with a list of all the available editions. Pick any of them - we're just doing a test here, not an actual installation.

Pick any edition, check the box, click Next. On the next screen continue on through till it gets to the portion of the installer where it either looks for your hard drives or it can see them, this is where you'll know whether you'll need the SATA RAID drivers or not or just the RAID drivers if you're still using IDE hardware; I didn't see mention of which one you have.

At this point, Vista will either see your drives/RAID or it won't. If it does, your drive(s) or partition(s) will be listed. Since you're just doing this test install to get that specific info, if you see drives/partitions here, that means Vista does have a working driver that can access the particular IDE/SATA/RAID controller your hardware has.

However...

If it complains about not having any hard drives to install Vista on, then yes, right then and there you know for certain that you'll need those drivers. But here's where Vista is finally better than previous versions of Windows:

You can use a floppy, if you have it, or you can burn those drivers onto a CD/DVD, or the really cool way is to use a USB thumb drive.

Put those drivers on whatever media you want (USB thumbdrive is obviously the newest and fastest method) and then follow the instructions as laid out above. When it needs drivers, follow the instructions onscreen and insert the USB thumbdrive with those drivers - or the floppy or CD, whichever method you chose - and browse for the TXTSETUP.OEM file, or maybe the .inf particular to the OS.

If those drivers come in folders, and there isn't a Vista folder, use the XP versions.

This should be enough to get you to the point where you know for certain if you'll need to provide the drivers on floppy, CD/DVD, or USB media, or if Vista is natively supporting your hardware.

Hope this helps...
 
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