Has anyone else tested Win7 32 vs 64 on their system

S

SlowCobra

Limp Gawd
Joined
Mar 15, 2008
Messages
501
So I have a 939 setup with an Athlon64 3400, 1.5GB ram, Nvidia 7300GS. It is currently my HTPC and I know a lot of people favor 32 bit over 64bit for this application. I originally loaded it with Win 7 RC 64 bit. For an older PC it seemed to run ok, not the best for running HULU but adequate for a poor man.

Being that 32 bit is the favored I figured what the hell I'll give it a shot. Initially I loaded it on a separate drive from the 64 bit install. It just felt sluggish even after all the updates. So I ran WEI on it. In the 64 bit install the graphics card comes back at 3.4 but in the 32 bit it comes back at 3.1. I thought to myself, well that can't be right perhaps the old IDE drive(10-2003) I loaded it on isn't up to snuff and drivers aren't loading right. So I replaced it with a brand new SATA drive and reloaded and set it up exactly like I have the 64 bit install. Same exact score when I run WEI as well as the same sluggish feeling.

I figured on the older system that the 32 bit with the low amount of memory would be the better choice. Apparently not.

So anyone tested this themselves or have any feedback towards this besides WEI sucks and don't pay attention to it?

As I said it wasn't just the score, it literally is visibly slower to complete tasks.
 
The only systems I've had where 64-bit feels slower are ram starved with 1GB or less.
 
So I'm the only idiot that performed a side by side comparison of the 2 versions?!? If one of my fellow nerds gets bored can you test it and see if it is just something with my system or if it actually is MS's subtle hint towards everyone telling them they should ditch 32bit.
 
Could be more than subtle in some cases.

The multi-touch drivers for my tx2 only come in 64 bit form! What's odd is that the company that makes the drivers, N-trig, seems to have actually developed both 32 and 64 bit drivers and even made reference to both versions in their release document at one point but subsequently removed that version of the release notes and both they and HP provide only the 64 bit version.

So in order for me to use my cool multi-touch tablet I HAVE to use x64 Not a big deal really. It's time to move on to x64 on the desktop.
 
I tested 32-bit and 64-bit a bunch about a year or two ago, back when there was still heavy debate between 32 and 64 bit. But now it's a given; 64-bit is your choice. Even manufacturers like Dell and HP preinstall the 64-bit versions of Windows onto their systems.

However, on some older systems this isn't the case, and they should stick with 32-bit. But you even ran some tests yourself and found that 64-bit seems to run better, so why not keep it?
 
While a lot of people will disagree, simply for compatibility sake, if your not running close to, or over 4GB, then stick with 32 bit. Even if it means 5% better compatibility, it's worth it since with that system you'll gain nothing by going 64 bit. WEI is OK tool to compare systems with but I highly doubt your gaining performance with 64 bit, thus resulting in a higher score, it's probably just a flaky driver. Even most native 64 bit applications are not inherently faster than their 32 bit counterparts. I don't think there are many 'true' 64 bit applications anyways; ones designed from the ground up as 64 bit with no 32 bit variant. I wouldn't doubt if 95% of native 64 bit applications are just 64 bit word values with 32 bits of code and 32 zeroes added to it.
 
bigdogchris said:
While a lot of people will disagree, simply for compatibility sake, if your not running close to, or over 4GB, then stick with 32 bit. Even if it means 5% better compatibility, it's worth it since with that system you'll gain nothing by going 64 bit. WEI is OK tool to compare systems with but I highly doubt your gaining performance with 64 bit, thus resulting in a higher score, it's probably just a flaky driver. Even most native 64 bit applications are not inherently faster than their 32 bit counterparts. I don't think there are many 'true' 64 bit applications anyways; ones designed from the ground up as 64 bit with no 32 bit variant. I wouldn't doubt if 95% of native 64 bit applications are just 64 bit word values with 32 bits of code and 32 zeroes added to it.
Click to expand...

But as I said, it is visually slower running 32 bit. That is the issue at hand. There is a complete and totally NOTICEABLE degradation of performance when running the 32 bit version. Has anyone actually compared side by side 32 vs 64 bit on their system and had a noticeable difference in performance?

In theory 32 bit, when under 4GB of memory should run faster. I understand the difference as well as the architecture behind it. While certainly not a genius when it comes to things I received my first MCSE on NT4 so as I said not a complete idiot(just partial) :D . I just find it odd that with no other changes other than the 32 vs 64 bit the OS that SHOULD run faster is actually slower at everything and not just WEI.
 
bigdogchris said:
While a lot of people will disagree, simply for compatibility sake, if your not running close to, or over 4GB, then stick with 32 bit. Even if it means 5% better compatibility, it's worth it since with that system you'll gain nothing by going 64 bit. WEI is OK tool to compare systems with but I highly doubt your gaining performance with 64 bit, thus resulting in a higher score, it's probably just a flaky driver. Even most native 64 bit applications are not inherently faster than their 32 bit counterparts. I don't think there are many 'true' 64 bit applications anyways; ones designed from the ground up as 64 bit with no 32 bit variant. I wouldn't doubt if 95% of native 64 bit applications are just 64 bit word values with 32 bits of code and 32 zeroes added to it.
Click to expand...
People would disagree because 64-bit extensions allow for a lot more secure system than was available with 32-bit including better kernel protection, so yeah, 64-bit, if your home system is hitting that 5% compatability number bigdog pulled out of his ass then upgrade whatever that is.
 
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