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On Fri, Jul 20, 2007 at 09:21:10PM +0800, P.V.Anthony wrote: |
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> The reason for this questions is that there are some information on the |
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> net that says that there is no much difference between them. |
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> Is that true? Thought that 64bit is always better. |
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Building a system 64-bit buys you: |
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- wider integers (so math with 64-bit integers is faster) |
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- wider pointers (so an application can have a *lot* more address space |
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allocated to it) |
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- bigger binaries and data structures (so more RAM consumed) |
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- future-proofing (in a few years, 32-bit hardware will not be |
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available new) |
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There's no "better" and it's not inherently faster in any way. As |
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another poster said, most UNIX apps have been running 64-bit on other |
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architectures (SPARC being the most common) for years, so compatibility |
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isn't a big deal. |
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Those are the points on which I base my 32/64 decisions. |
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|
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Dustin |
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-- |
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gentoo-amd64@g.o mailing list |
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