[GRLUG] Random questions.

[Bob Kline]

On Thu, Jul 26, 2012 at 10:15 PM, Michael Mol <mikemol at gmail.com> wrote:

> On Thu, Jul 26, 2012 at 9:26 PM, Bob Kline <bob.kline at gmail.com> wrote:
> > I still use a 32-bit version of Linux.
> > What's to be gained or lost by going
> > to a 64-bit version?
>
> Larger address space.
>
> Reduced memory fragmentation (so, less process memory bloat)
>
> Improved performance, owing to utilization of more general-purpose
> registers.
>
> What's to lose? At worst, some small amount of memory due to increased
> pointer size, but this shouldn't be a problem unless you're running in
> embedded-type environments. Practically speaking, it's a nonissue for
> most users.
>

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Physical_Address_Extension

Apparently more than 4GB of RAM
is not necessarily an issue yet with
32-bit CPUs, thanks to PAE.

Anyway, I thought the 32-bit  versus
64-bit differences might be more
consequential, but just as it's taken
ages to fully exploit 32-bit processors,
that seems to also apply to 64-bit now.
But apparently one is still typically an
order of magnitude away in terms of
memory sizes, and maybe other hardware,
before native 64 bit makes any difference
for the home user.

   -- Bob
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