64bit processor with 32bit Windows 7 Shooting myself in the foot?

NathanA

Title pretty much says it. I just recently noticed that I have a 32bit version of Windows Seven installed on my machine but a 64bit chip.

My chip is a AMD Athlon 64 x2 Dual Core Processor 4600+ GHz

What I am wondering is... how bad is this killing my performance with programs like Maya 2010 and Photoshop CS4? Is it cutting my performance in half with Maya?
Trying not to sound like a total noob... but I guess I kind of am in this scenario.

Ben Apuna

I used XP32bit on a 64bit processor for a while and it was a night and day switch when I went over to Vista 64bit.

I'm not sure how much that had to do with the processor. It might have just been that I could then access all 8GB of my RAM (with 64bit apps), whereas with XP32 bit I was limited to around 3.5 GB of RAM for the whole system and 2GB for each application.

If you've got more than 2 GB of RAM you will notice a difference.

NathanA

Thanks for the reply Ben Apuna
I only have 2gb at the moment so I guess I wouldn't see the same jump you did. I would have to assume that everything would... work better though with both at 64bit right? I did read some stuff online though and people were complaining about certain apps not working when they switched over to 64... So I guess I just really need to read more about the difference.

thedaemon

Everything I've thrown at Win 7 64bit has ran fine, no problems with it, just check to see if your hardware has drivers. My webcam is the only thing that doesn't have drivers. 64bit just means it uses larger chunks of memory when doing calculations. You will need 64bit once you go over 3gb of ram.

Ben Apuna

You probably don't have to worry about apps not working. 32 bit apps will work fine, 16 bit (Windows 3.1/DOS era) apps will not. Like thedaemon said some old hardware might not be compatible.

2gb?!!!!!

I used to be working on a 1.5gb ram system and it sucked I can't imagine 2 is much better.

Do yourself a favor and buy some more ram. It doesn't have to be top of the line expensive or anything just get more and switch to 64bit Win7 while you're at it.

Find out what type of ram you can use with your motherboard (hopefully this isn't a laptop...) and get more. Even 4-6 would be better, 8-12 would be great. The amount you should buy depends on your motherboard though. Definitely research before you buy.

NathanA

Thanks for the replies guys. Sounds like I should upgrade my ram
It's not a laptop but its getting old.. just need it to last till I land the next job.