Studio 17 owners, why are you upgrading to 64 bit?

right now, i'm seriously considering purchasing the Studio 17 to replace my current laptop that is becoming somewhat unreliable...

but as i'm reading through the threads, i notice many folks upgrade to Vista Ultimate 64 bit and face issues with ejecting the ODD...

why the upgrade and what are the benefits?

secondly, as per my post on "What to Buy" thread seen here, i'm torn between the 2 laptops...

briefly...

Dell Studio 17 Ruby Red $1795 incl Tax, S&H

* Intel® Core™ 2 Duo T9300 (2.5GHz/800Mhz FSB/6MB cache)
* Windows Vista® Home Premium Edition SP1
* Hi Resolution, glossy widescreen 17.0 inch display (1920x1200)
* 256MB ATI MOBILITY RADEON HD 3650
* 4GB Shared Dual Channel DDR2
* 250GB SATA Hard Drive (5400RPM)
* 8X Slot Load CD / DVD Burner (Dual Layer DVD+/-R Drive)
* Dell 1510 Wireless-N Card
* Integrated 2.0M Pixel Webcam
* 56 Whr Lithium Ion Battery (6 cell)
* High Definition Audio 2.0
* Back-lit Keyboard
* Integrated Finger Print Reader


vs

Dell Precision M6300: @ $2353 incl Tax, S&H

* Intel® Core™ 2 Duo T9300 (2.50GHz) 6M L2 Cache, 800MHz Dual Core
* Genuine Windows Vista Business Bonus-Windows XP Professional downgrade
* 3 Year Basic Limited Warranty and 3 Year NBD On-Site Service
* NVIDIA® Quadro FX 1600M 512MB TurboCache (256MB discrete)
* 17 inch Wide Screen WUXGA TrueLife LCD Panel
* Touchpad AND UPEK® Fingerprint Reader
* 1.0GB, DDR2-667 SDRAM, 2 DIMMS
* 80GB Hard Drive, 9.5MM, 5400RPM
* 8X DVD-ROM w/ CyberLink PowerDVD™
* Dell Wireless™ 1395 802.11g Mini Card
* NTFS File System
* Quick Reference Guide

my Work Applications:
Corel Draw
Photoshop
Illustrator
Stupid Large Excel Files
Outlook
Word...

my Games:
WoW
Total War series... which one are we on?...


so in light of the 2 systems, the $$$ aspect makes me wanna get the Studio 17... since the Precision, i will need to upgrade the Ram, HDD eventually...

what do you guys think?

as you can see, i dont need world record breaking fast computer... i dont play FPS games as much... well, no lag or little lag at Shatt or IF is nice... when playing wow...

sorry for the repeat... but any thoughts would be appreciated...

 

the main reasons some people install 64bit versions of Vista are

1) Support for 4gb (or more)
2) vastly improved security
3) access to twice the number of general purpose registers
4) most benchmarks show it to be generally 10-15% faster than Vista32.
5) eliminates a lot of memory thrashing, improves thread context switching

one potential problem of 64bit Vista is driver support. For newer systems, this generally isn't a problem.

a lot of applications are now releasing 64bit versions as well (firefox, thunderbird, maya, 3dsmax, IE7/8....)
Adobe seems to be resisting releasing anything for 64bit OS's. So Flash won't run in Firefox64... and photoshop will still only have access to max 3.5gb

Note that if you run a program compiled for 32bits under Vista64, it will run in WOW64 emulation mode and you will not have access to 4gb in that app....

So if you do install Vista64, you will want to run 64bit versions of those apps when possible.

 

thanks for the detailed answer there Steb...

so as for Studio 17 vs M6300... hmm....

 

Does this mean you are still able to use programs that run with 32bit whilst running in 64bit, thy just wont be able to use more than 3gb?

 

Yes you can still run almost any program developed for x86. I have yet to find one that requires me to use compatibility mode.

To the OP. Why get such an expensive processor if you don't need anything amazingly fast. I don't personally think you will notice much difference to warrant the extra cost. I picked the T8100 and have everything you listed for the Studio except I have the 9 cell battery, 320gb HD, and I opted for the regular 1440x900 screen since I game. My entire package was about $1075 shipped. So I would wait until you find better deals unless your package includes lots of extra warranty perks.

 

between the two I would take the studio. More RAM as configured, lower price and a graphics card suited to your gaming needs.

I also would definitely go 64 bit OS. Sure, there may be some more issues but by and large, it is the future. I already use a minimum of almost 1.5Gb of RAM everyday as it is. Won't be much longer before 3 Gb and beyond is standard fare.

 

I just realized this thread is old and he already purchased the Studio.

 

oh yea.. hehe.. well thanks for the advice nevertheless...