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[Solved] The pros and cons of downgrading to Win 7 32bit from 64bit

Forum Windows 7 : Windows 7 General Discussion - [Solved] The pros and cons of downgrading to Win 7 32bit from 64bit

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Best answer from buwish.

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staylorist   11-10-2009 at 05:33:02 PM

I can't decide whether I should downgrade from Windows 7 64bit to 32bit. I am having a lot of unfortunately program specific problems with the 64bit version. I also only have 4gigs of ram so I don't know if a 32 bit version would work any differently other than relieving me of my issues.

They are specifically:
A few unsigned drivers I would like to use like ATI Tray Tools
Dragon Age: Origins crashes constantly (known issue)
Nikon Capture NX2 does not support 64bit OSs and will continually crash
Nikon's NEF(RAW) Codec is not compatible with 64bit OSs (actually only a minor annoyance)
Bugs with ViewNX
I think I am forgetting one or two others atm.

So my real question is, what would I be losing if I am running Windows 7 32bit instead of 64bit on this machine?

Gigabyte GS-X38-DS4 board with E8400 and 4 gigs of Ram

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Best answer from buwish
Driver wise, you'll probably see an improvement in terms of more compatibility and just being able to find them. Depending on your RAM and MOBO, you'll be able to use roughly 3-3.5GB with 32-bit, so not a major down fall. If worse comes to worse and you prefer 64-bit, you could do a dual boot with say Vista or XP 64 bit.
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buwish   11-10-2009 at 06:26:37 PM
Best answer

Driver wise, you'll probably see an improvement in terms of more compatibility and just being able to find them. Depending on your RAM and MOBO, you'll be able to use roughly 3-3.5GB with 32-bit, so not a major down fall. If worse comes to worse and you prefer 64-bit, you could do a dual boot with say Vista or XP 64 bit.

------------------------------ -Kevin
Desktop: Q9400(stock,lapped,SpinTechQ)/Intel DP43TF/VTEK 4850(512)/8GB DDR2 800Mhz/X-Fi Titanium Pro/Liteon BD-ROM/Velociraptor/Windows 7 Pro 64-bit
Laptop: Toshiba Satellite (M305)/T6400/4GB DDR2 800Mhz/Windows 7 Pro 64-bit (for now)
 Reply to buwish
staylorist   11-10-2009 at 06:30:45 PM

Dual boxing Vista 64 is exactly what I am doing now. Especially because it seems that Red Faction Guerrilla will never work correctly with Windows 7 (it runs in hyper speed and Volition disgustingly refuses to support Win 7).

Other than the Memory bit, is there anything else that the 64bit version would hold over the 32bit?

Thank you.

Reply to staylorist
Jonmor68   11-10-2009 at 06:56:02 PM

You have to look at YOUR needs. Seeing that programs and devices which you use are not supported by 64 bit, I suggest you install the 32 bit version.
If and when you replace or upgrade the devices and programs to 64 bit complient versions, then you can install a 64 bit OS. Chances are that by that time Windows 8+ may be released and you may be ready for a new computer.
I'm running the 32 bit with 3 GB of ram, from the Beta through RC to RTM without any problems.
I do a lot of video editing and record 3 FTA channels at the same time without any problems, the 3 GB handles it fine.

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