Is it worthwhile to get Win7 64-bit? I already have a copy of 32-bit, but the system only sees 3GB of the 6GB RAM installed. Not sure I want to re-image just to get to 64-bit, but it was surprisingly quick to go from clean install to fully functioning PC with Windows 7 (in about 2 hours) so it might be worth it to go to 64-bit.
“For God will not permit that we shall know what is to come... those who by some sorcery or by some dream might come to pierce the veil that lies so darkly over all that is before them may serve by just that vision to cause that God should wrench the world from its heading and set it upon another course altogether and then where stands the sorcerer? Where the dreamer and his dream?”
It all depends on your needs.
An average user, with no poweruse needs will live well with win7x32
I have tried both and see no real differences, nothing worth it for my needs.
It might become useful in the future, but not right now.
It adds a little more compatibility issues, potentially, so you really need to see for yourself.
Unless you have many apps needing lots of ram, do it.
If you want to experience it, try it.
Ram was cheap, not too long ago, so many people had too much of it and absolutely wanted to use that ram space, thus decided to try a 64bit os. I guess you're near that category of users.
All the things I really like to do are either illegal, immoral, or fattening. And then: Golf.
I upgraded from XP 32bit to W7x64 around 5 months ago or something. I've only got 3GB of system RAM, but to my knowledge, upgrading to 64bit lets me use a videocard with more video RAM while allowing me to address that 3GB of RAM in full (since memory addressing and its limit applies to both system and video RAM).Originally Posted by Animeniax
I have ran into compatibility issues with software, but I can't really remember the specifics of the few, so I guess it's not that important. It's actually probably more of a W7/XP issue than a 32/64bit issue.
Besides the extra memory, there isn't much else beneficial about it, from experience, since there's hardly any commonly used programs that are written for other x64 performance gains anyway.
The only times I've actually hit my 3GB limit was with Nero and Borderlands.
Both times were due to memory leaks and/or memory hogging bugs.
If it's not Isuzu-chan Mii~
For somebody with no copy yet it's absolutely 64-bit since I dare say going for 64 doesn't have any adverse effects unless you plan to run some special software (that might not work on Win 7 anyway like Bill said), but it's more future proof. But if you needed to shell out money for the 64-bit version when you already had the 32-bit one (for some reason), then it's another matter.
If it costs you nothing, switch to 64-bit. A real man won't be satisfied with 32-bits if 64-bits are available.
Thanks for the feedback guys. I've had the copy of 32-bit for a while since by previous setup was 32-bit, but since my CPU died I had to replace it and the motherboard. I went with the 6GB of RAM because of the triple channel memory and I didn't do the research to see if it was necessary or if 4GB could run in triple channel or if it would drop to dual channel and I'd see a performance hit, so I went with 6GB triple. Of course, Win7 32-bit only uses 3GB of it so it feels like a waste of resources, which is why I'm considering getting 64-bit. As a student, I can get a copy of 64-bit for $34US, so it's not an issue of expense.
I didn't want to wait until Monday to get the copy of 64-bit so I installed 32-bit on Friday when I installed the new motherboard and CPU. Now it's a question of whether or not it's worth it to re-image again to install the 64-bit and all of the updates and programs.
“For God will not permit that we shall know what is to come... those who by some sorcery or by some dream might come to pierce the veil that lies so darkly over all that is before them may serve by just that vision to cause that God should wrench the world from its heading and set it upon another course altogether and then where stands the sorcerer? Where the dreamer and his dream?”
The story is a little different then.
It's too little a hassle, not to directly go for it.
So, just go.
All the things I really like to do are either illegal, immoral, or fattening. And then: Golf.
I needed to install Win 7 three times when I built this machine, for various reasons. It sucked to need to reinstall it two extra times and it took hours with all the programs and stuff. But on the other hand, now I don't see a need to do it again for the foreseeable future and there's nothing in the back of my mind telling me everything's not right. If you now stick to the 32-bit just because of avoiding a few hours of work, you might find yourself regretting it many more hours down the road in the future.
Like they say: If you do something, do it properly.
Good points, I'm buying the copy of Win7 64 today.
I've always thought about taking an image of the system right after it's built with all of the software and updates installed but for some reason I've only ever done it once, and then I ended up not using the image when I had to re-image my system.
“For God will not permit that we shall know what is to come... those who by some sorcery or by some dream might come to pierce the veil that lies so darkly over all that is before them may serve by just that vision to cause that God should wrench the world from its heading and set it upon another course altogether and then where stands the sorcerer? Where the dreamer and his dream?”
You can also create a savepoint for your system after your clean install, rename it.
It's very efficient too.
I tend to create such points before installing any software or making changes to the system.
The rollback is painless and quite quick.
I can not tell wether it will save the system in all cases, but up to now, in the 50 times I had to use it on different boxes, I had no troubles.
All the things I really like to do are either illegal, immoral, or fattening. And then: Golf.
I might give that a try, but I've never had to utilize that kind of recovery method before. I'd only do the image process so I could quickly re-image after a harddrive change or something similar.
“For God will not permit that we shall know what is to come... those who by some sorcery or by some dream might come to pierce the veil that lies so darkly over all that is before them may serve by just that vision to cause that God should wrench the world from its heading and set it upon another course altogether and then where stands the sorcerer? Where the dreamer and his dream?”
I admitt I never had to use a full backup, so I do not know how it works and if it works well.
All the things I really like to do are either illegal, immoral, or fattening. And then: Golf.
I installed win 7 ultimate 64bit without any problem. I was using the RC about a year ago when my computer died, at that time I stop using it and went back to win xp pro 32bit. Just recently my mobo died again, so I went ahead and installed the win 7 64 bit. I was done in 30minutes and have not had problem in over 2months.(except when i shifted my graphic card-loose in the pci e slot- and the computer had problems when I wake it up from screensaver)
Full backups take longer to do (generally a few hours), but store the PC's information in a much more comprehensive manner. You can reimage full backups when the OS can't boot as well.
The problem I had with Windows XP's System Restore was that it only partially saves my information, such that I've had cases where the computer thinks I've got a program installed (because it saved that registry info), but fails to run it because it failed to save my files for that program (which were wiped out), making re-installing a bitch because it won't re-install when it thinks it's already there, or when it can't find uninstall.exe on the file.
For my other household computers I've done an initial backup after the OS and essential programs have been installed, while I've done periodic full-backups of mine (monthly or so). I've never had to use them, so I don't know if they work.
It seems W7 comes with its own backup solution, but I have yet to try it out.
If it's not Isuzu-chan Mii~
I meant I never used W7 full backup solution
I already imaged many systems and reinstalled full images with clonezilla or other solutions.
W7 has image and system snapshots backups solutions.
I used the snapshot rollbacks, but not the image one yet. From Jan 09 and my first win7 beta install, I never had a problem that would require a full image rollback.
Considering how prices have fallen, I love the win7+nas+logmein combo to manage average users desktops.
All the things I really like to do are either illegal, immoral, or fattening. And then: Golf.
I've been trying to keep weekly updated the full image of my System disk using Win 7's own backup functionality. It's on an external HD, though, and sometimes I forget to do it because the HD isn't normally powered. Now that small, old external HD is filling up so I'll need to swap a bigger disk in.
Luckily I've never needed to rely on it to restore anything.
You're not deleting the older images?
If it's not Isuzu-chan Mii~
The Win 7 backupper updates the old image. But I set it to backup the whole HD, which is actually two partitions, the other containing games, and that means it's taking a lot of space.
Or at least that's how I think it works. Otherwise I'd have run out of space on the external HD during the second writing. My system disk is 640GB and the external HD is measly 250GB...
I installed Win7 64-bit but I think I messed up and did an upgrade install instead of a clean install. It now sees all 6GB of RAM.
For some reason the system seems to run slower with 64-bit than it did with 32-bit. Is this something I should worry about?
“For God will not permit that we shall know what is to come... those who by some sorcery or by some dream might come to pierce the veil that lies so darkly over all that is before them may serve by just that vision to cause that God should wrench the world from its heading and set it upon another course altogether and then where stands the sorcerer? Where the dreamer and his dream?”
A few variables may contribute to that:
1) file fragmentation
2) "dirty" upgrade by microsoft
3) Running 32bit software in emulation under a 64bit environment.
If it's not Isuzu-chan Mii~
Well the 32-bit install was a clean install less than a week ago and so there won't be much fragmentation. I'm using a WD Raptor 150 (it's about 1.5 years old, but still runs great and at 10k RPM).
What do you mean by "dirty upgrade"? I'm considering wiping it all out and starting from scratch with the 64-bit OS, but that will be another 2 hours I'd rather spend playing SC2.
The system runs slower all the time, even for file access and Windows explorer.
“For God will not permit that we shall know what is to come... those who by some sorcery or by some dream might come to pierce the veil that lies so darkly over all that is before them may serve by just that vision to cause that God should wrench the world from its heading and set it upon another course altogether and then where stands the sorcerer? Where the dreamer and his dream?”
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