Confused!!

Does anyone know what the difference between Windows Vista 32Bit and 64Bit??
I asked sumone at bestbuy and they didnt know.

 

Take a look at this thread/guide.

Guide to 64bit

 

Ya 64 blue screens more

 

LOL. I am gonna try to keep count but honestly they both bluescreen so much my calcultor can't handle past 12 digits...

32-bit and 64-bit refers to how data is handled. 32-bit wide data is data that can either be from 0 to 2^32 or -2^31 to +2^31.

64-bit data is the same idea.

Any way. Brief and short explanation. Vista 32-bit works with 32-bit processors. I am not going to get to technical but 32-bit processors can handle data of all kinds including registers, addresses etc. upto the 2^32 at once. It has to break up data largerer than such into smaller fragments of 32-bit registers or 2^n where n < 32. Its hard to explain this, this is the most simplified answer I got come up with. Any way Vista 32-bit can only handle 32-bit applications and can only have access for upto 4GiB of memory since or 2^32. In reality Vista is based on Microsoft NT. Nt was the first 32-bit operating system available form Microsoft. They never really perfected the ability to access upto 32-bit memory due to alot of overhead in the OS, and that is why Vista 32-bit struggles to read 4 GB of memory.

Vista 64 bit is everything I just said but with 2^64 and the theoritcal capability of handling upto 2^64 memory. That is ofcourse not the case and since no single computer system has that much memory, 64-bit Vista can only handle upto about 8 Gigabytes of memory as has been maxed out by some super servers.

This is probably the reason that the Best Buy employee could not answer your question because to give you a correct answer, he would need either a 4-year degree in computer science or engineeriing or atleast a 2 year IT certification.

 

*cough* The guy who wrote that guide worked at BestBuy. Great high school/college job *cough*.

 

I like your explanation but 64bit can handle more than 8gbs, and you dont need a "super server" to do so. It only costs several hundred dollars for 2 sets of 2x2gb sticks these days and many motherboards support it.

picture taken from: http://www.microsoft.com/windows/products/windowsvista/editions/64bit.mspx

 

Well ya I mentioned that it can handle well over 8 GB's. I just said that the largest known consumer computer, which is what I refer to as the super server, even though its a normal PC, is equipped with 8 GB's since that is what the performance motherboards sold to consumers can handle.

Actual super servers also known as mainframes have much more memory equipped. There are some with upwards of 128 GB plus of memory.

Sure some BestBuy employees might know there stuff, they read around, but most generally don't. I realize that alot of them are in college or whatever, but man I have dealt with some complete fools who worked in their computers deperatment who just go around in circles.

 

I don't depend on salespeople too much. That's why I do research before I go in the store, saves me time and their time. There are some stellar knowledgeable people but most are not. Also some customers just go there and test their knowledge and not buy anything! Those are the types I hate the most because I have to wait until they finish playing games with the salespeople.

 

And you will find some from this forum that do that.

 

I am feeling a "tell all" thread!

 

OK Thanks for all the explanations

 

IM just wondering, but that is my rep power means?

 

Take a look at this thread.

Reputation Points/Power and User Titles

If you have further questions about rep, post it there.