Vista or XP in 32 or 64-bit?

Information - Well, I have a laptop that I got from my parents a year ago. It's the Gateway MT6459, the specifications can be found here.

Temperatures - On Vista 32-bit, the laptop gets hot... like around 80-100 degrees Celsius, and on XP 32-bit, the laptop's temperature is . These temperatures are usually without games, but with games, it's around the same. This is for CPU temperature by the way. The Hard Drive temperature is around 50-60 degrees Celsius for both Vista and XP. The GPU temperature is around 60-70 degrees.

What I use my laptop for - Well, I use my laptop mainly for doing homework and typing up documents, surfing the web, and checking email. Once in a while (Maybe like 3 hours per day), I play games. I'm looking forward to Diablo 3 and Starcraft 2, by the way. I also download anime and watch it.

Main Question - So what do you guys recommend getting? Vista or XP, 32 or 64 bit? I used MACs and Linux before, but their just not my type.

My appreciation - Thanks to those who helped me and actually read through all the information I have typed up, I also don't know if I put this in the right place. Currently I am going to run a 3DMark06 test and put up my results.

 

I would recommend Vista 64 bit for 2 reasons, 1 its future proof for a while and second you don't have to worry about viruses. The drivers and software issues that everyone seems to worry about really only apply to Xp64bit back in the day. Now pretty much every program will run in Vista 64bit except for 16bit programs. 32bit programs will run in emulation and you won't notice much of a difference but more and more programs with 64bit support. Since your worried about temperatures you should check out undervolting the CPU since its your main source of heat on a laptop. Theres a guide on NBR that is extremely helpful.

 

Oh, I see... I undervolted the CPU from 1.250V to 1.000V, The temperatures only decreased by 5, which is from 100 to 95 degress celsius. But when I decrease it from 1.250V to 0.750V, the max temperature is 75 degress celsius, but then the laptop would run slowly... Also, do I need to have RMclock on after I undervolted it, or could I just uninstall and delete it.

Edit - Also, would my 32-bit Vista key work for the 64-bit Vista key? And where can I download Vista 64-bit?

 

Vista 32 key should work on vista 64 bit... it did for me. As to where you get it from... that's your business. Buy it or use methods not discussable on this forum. Yes, you need to have RMclock running to achieve the undervolt.

Others may disagree with the following but take it for what it's worth: I discussed undervolting with my brother, who works on making chips for communications satellites. He said that undervolting should affect performance, especially heavy undervolting.

 

If your CPU is reaching 100 C you need to turn it off immediately and find out what is wrong. It doesn't matter what OS you use, you have hard ware issues.

Once you get that taken care of, take a look at Vista x64.

 

Wrt the temps, clean out the laptop with a can of compressed air and a vacuum cleaner. Temperatures of 100C will destroy the computer sooner or later.

 

+1 for Vista x64.

 

+1 for vista x64

but i cant get rmclock to work

 

Ahh, I see... Thanks for you help, guys. I'm going to get Vista x64 from my friend.

 

Best way to undervolt successfully is to it in conjunction with Orthos but first things first, get the temp down!!

 

Oh, also... another question... For the Vista key, it's only Home Premium right? Won't work for any other editions?

Edit - How do I save more battery power? I have 1 hour on XP and 1 and a half hour on Vista.

 

Go to control panel -> mobile settings (in default view, not classic), ->adjust commonly used mobility settings -> change plan settings. Make sure you're on power saver mode, then go to change plan settings and adjust all of the stuff that you don't need or want reduced.

Unless you don't have an external switch for wireless, use maximum power for the wireless adapter and just turn it off when not in use. The adapter is pretty much useless at anything bellow maximum power.

 

My usual power saving settings for the CPU performance is 0% and 25% maxed on battery... I just don't turn off wireless when I don't need it.