Windows Vista- 32 or 64 bit?

[Clint_Smith]

Ok I am building a new PC, and I am trying to understand the whole vista thing.

I know there is a 32bit and a 64 bit version. If I buy the 64 bit version and fork over the extra cash, will my 32 bit programs work?

Also what 64 bit version do I need...Home basic, business?????? Basically I am building a photoshop/post processing machine, that will also fulfill my gaming addiction...

[Pyrex]

Originally Posted by Clint_Smith

Ok I am building a new PC, and I am trying to understand the whole vista thing.

They will absolutely work. Windows 64bit actually runs 32bit programs slightly faster than even 32bit - excellent emulation.

The advantage with 64bit is you can access more than 4GB of memory. If you do large scale image editing, you probably will be interested in this. I run 18GB and I still max my memory out sometimes with 20x30" image batches.

I suggest Vista x64 Ultimate. Best place to buy is newegg.com and get the systems builder edition, I believe it's around $179.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16832116215

[jeffkohn]

I also recommend x64 (as to which version exactly, I suggest finding the comparison matrix on MS website to see if you really care about any of the features in Ultimate).

Even with 4GB of RAM, Vista x64 will perform better than x86, because the OS will actually be able to use the full 4GB (you'll only get use of 2-3GB on Vista x86). Bump up to 8GB and things get even nicer. I can give a full 3GB to Photoshop without starving the rest of the system for memory, which means better disk cache performance, a well as more memory for other applications running at the same time (Bridge, Outlook, IE, etc).

Also keep in mind the next version of Photoshop will have a native 64-bit version (for Windows at least).

[SCone]

x64 will access 16 exabytes of RAM (that's over 17 billion gigabytes), probably need a whole room for that much RAM.

And x32 does "use" all of the 4gig of RAM, but since the OS can only access 4 gig total memory addresses, things like video, hard drive, BIOS, etc. have to be part of that same address space. Whatever is remaining gets used by the OS.

FWIW