On Mon, Sep 27, 2010 at 10:30:12PM +0200, Fritz
Meissner wrote:
Yes, you can install the 32 bit version. From
what I have heard, the
performance difference is not significant, but the major benefit of 64
bit is being able to address more than 4 GB of memory, which is the
limit of what a 32 bit OS can use.
For workstation/desktop users, is that really a bigger difference than
the extra registers or the extra wide registers?
32bit linux can use more than 4 gigs of ram even though any individual
program is limited. However, I don't seem to see all that many
audio (or general use desktop) programs, that need more than 2 gigs of
RAM.
Not general use, perhaps, but my preferred image processing application
(Bibble) says 2G minimum and recommends much more. It works with 48-bit
RAW image files and has an in-memory SQLLite image database. So memory
consumption can add up.
I have the 32-bit version, haven't tried the 64-bit version.
--
David
gnome(a)hawaii.rr.com
authenticity, honesty, community