Vostro 1520 enabling 64 bit computing capability?

Hi there,
I have a dell vostro laptop, core 2 duo, p8700, 2.53 ghz, 3 gb ram, geforce 9300m gs. I tried few days ago to install win 7 x64 as virtual os on vmware and it says that my cpu does not support 64 bits os.
Please advice, is this particular vostro 1520 cpu only x86 capable or there is a way to enable x64 computing? Please note that my host os is xp 32 bit and that I enabled intel vt in bios. Thanks a lot for any valuable advice.

 

The P8700 supports 64 bit. However, I wonder if it is possible to install a virtual 64 bit OS inside a 32 bit OS (the former's potentially bigger addressing range is constrained by the latter's limitations). You probably have to install a 64 bit version of Windows (the Windows key on your computer should work). One way to confirm that the hardware supports a 64 bit OS is download a 64 bit version of Linux and burn a live CD. If that runs then the problem must be trying to run 64 bit inside 32 bit (it will work the other way round).

John

 

The P8700 supports amd64. The question is, does VMWare support 64bit guests on 32bit hosts? Virtualbox does that via simple pass-through, so in the VM the host system architecture doesn't matter. I'm not sure how VMWare does that, but if it uses an emulator between guest and CPU the host architecture will affect the guest too.

 

Thanks a lot. It worked. I run again the installation of win 7-64 guest into 32 host after I enabled vt in bios. It deluded me that I could not find any info related to x64 capability of p8700 processor in any cpu tool I used. I use 2gb out of 3 of ram in the guest os and both processors. It goes pretty well but the sound is not so smooth. Thanks..

 

You are using a 32bit host and installed a 64bit guest in VMWare?