28 Sep
2010
28 Sep
'10
12:36 a.m.
Hi,
On Monday 27 September 2010 22:26:17 Josh Lawrence wrote:
I'm late to the party when it comes to 64-bit
machines, so apologies
in advance if I am asking something that should be obvious...
I recently purchased a 64 bit machine and like it a lot, but I've
noticed that some software that is usually available on a 32 bit
machine isn't available in the 64 bit repos that I am using. Can I
install the 32 bit version of my distro (Debian) on my 64 bit machine?
I'm assuming that would give me access to all 32 bit software. It
would also be a performance hit, correct?
You really are late for the fight. 64bit has won by the mile. (Which doesn't
surprise anyone since this fight has been finished several years ago.)
There are no practical advantages of 32bit over 64bit on 64bit hardware. Only
disadvantages.
Note that 32bit can not address 4GB of memory, only 3.something. More is only
supported with the PAE extension of the kernel. Which still leaves userspace
processes with 3.something GB addressable space. Unless you want to recompile
all your apps with 64bit pointers which reduces performance on 32bit kernels
significantly...
And there are some (proprietary) kernel modules that don't understand PAE...
Just install your machine with a 64bit linux. If there really are apps that
aren't available for 64bit, bug your distribution.
Have fun,
Arnold