Re: [gentoo-amd64] 64-bit or 32-bit?

[Mike Melanson]

Anand Buddhdev wrote:
> Hello fellow list members,
>
> I'm getting a new AMD64-based computer, and I'd like to run gentoo on
> it. I have been doing a bit of reading about running linux on AMD64, and
> it seems that in general, it's not a problem. The main issues seem to be
> with firefox 32-bit plugins, and win32 codecs for use with mplayer. My
> reading seems to suggest that if I stick to firefox-bin and mplayer32,
> then I should be fine. However, I'd like to hear from people who're
> already using gentoo on amd64, and what their experience is. Is it
> simple to get these apps to work? Or was there a lot of frustration
> involved. I've used linux and BSD systems for a long time, so I'm used
> to hacking, and I'm not afraid to mess around with scripts and
> compilers. But I've reached a point when I'd just like to be able to
> install a system, and have it work. Fedora Core almost allows that,
> except that I'm a bit fed up of the multiple repository problems, and no
> proper way of picking and choosing what exactly I want. I could
> recompile some of the packages from SRPMS, and specify my choices. But I
> reckoned that if recompiling was the way to go, then I'd give gentoo a try.
>
> One of the choices I'm facing is whether to install gentoo 64-bit, or
> 32-bit. Installing 32-bit on the AMD64 would make life easy, but kind of
> defeats the purpose of having a 64-bit processor. Hence my request for
> opinions. Should I go 64-bit, or stay in the 32-bit world for now?

	For most of what I have to do, 64-bit Gentoo works famously. Yes, the 
multimedia codec thing is a problem which is very near and dear to my 
heart (see my email address). The community is working hard on reverse 
engineering major codecs in order to mitigate this problem.

-- 
	-Mike Melanson
-- 
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