Re: [linux-audio-user] AMD64 question

On 6/27/06, Dave Phillips &lt;dlphillips(a)woh.rr.com&gt; wrote: I got an Antec Sonata last year for about $100. It's a good case, fairly quiet in its basic components. I like the Zalman fans, too. I've got two AMD64 systems. So far, both are running in 32-bit mode. They run *very* well that way, and all Linux applications I've tried work fine. Others (like Mark Knecht) have told you their experience with AMD64. If you want to play with that, I'm sure it is a worthwhile exercise. The more people use it, the more software problems get fixed. For practical engineering, the only two reasons I know for running in 64-bit mode are: (1) more general-purpose registers available to the compiler; and (2) can run more than 3GB of real memory. Reason (1) should help some when running audio applications, though the storage accesses saved must be traded off against the larger cache footprint due to 64-bit pointers, integers, etc. I believe the benefit is relatively small (<10%), but have not done any tests myself. For some plugins this effect may be more dramatic. Reason (2) is not an issue for me right now, I've only got 1GB of ram. This is mainly important for database servers, so they can fit the whole database in real memory, only doing I/O for the log writes and occasional updates of modified pages. It is not important for most current-generation audio applications. Several people have mentioned the benefits of Gentoo. If you prefer a relatively trouble-free, up-to-date binary distribution, I have been very happy with Ubuntu Dapper. The Ubuntu Studio project provides a large set of relatively recent audio applications. Fedora plus the Planet CCRMA packages is also a good choice. Happy to help. You're going to enjoy your new machine. ;-) -- joq