Athlon 64

[imported_cubby]

Thanks Vee, I guess I just get the urge to do so. My fiance doesnt like to hear that since we need to save money for our wedding coming up 🙂. My system is very capable now as I upgraded a couple of years back. Maybe I'll just wait til the fall and see if some of the higher end CPU's come down in price. Take care!

 

[Jeff7181]

Originally posted by: cubby
Thanks Vee, I guess I just get the urge to do so. My fiance doesnt like to hear that since we need to save money for our wedding coming up 🙂. My system is very capable now as I upgraded a couple of years back. Maybe I'll just wait til the fall and see if some of the higher end CPU's come down in price. Take care!

The low memory latency of the A64 will help for AI and physics... and the GeForce 6800's Geometry Instancing will help for the actual graphics as soon as sports games are coded to use Geometry Instancing. Other than that, "if it ain't broke, don't fix it."

 

[Steeplerot]

Fedora Core 3 x86_64
Try that out on your nforce 4 64 bit and tell me you can't feel the diffrence.
It's not AMD making a worthless 64 bit chip it's just that your using a worthless 32 bit OS 😉
-when I unzip/tar a huge file you can really tell a diffrence, that the A64 is really doing the 64 bit brute number crunching it was made for.
XP feels slow to me now, the 64 bit windows is a real dog too.
Raw power, even moreso in 64 bit linux. Anything less is a waste of a damn strong chips potential.

 

[bunnyfubbles]

Originally posted by: dhoytw

Originally posted by: bunnyfubbles
The 64bit capability is more like unexpected sprinkles on an icecream cone. What matters is that even without the negligable sprinkles, AMDs icecream is as good if not better than intel's, especially in games. 😉

64 bit isn't useless, Microsoft even offers a free version of Windows XP Pro x64 (then there's also Linux), although this doesn't mean you can go and use a 64bit OS as a complete replacement to your 32bit ones. Slowly we're seeing more driver support, and even some programs written to give you bonuses in 64bit that you don't have in 32. Performance isn't going to be much of a factor in the near future, a major advantage to 64bit is the use of more than 4GB of ram, which isn't really a problem for your average user anyways... that and it really isn't much of an option, or a good one even if it is as a Gig of blistering fast ram is going to offer a lot more direct bennefits to your average user than 4GB of slow stuf.

The 64 bit version of windows that's out there really doesn't work that great with these chips even though it was designed for 64 bit CPU's. If you look at the benchmarks for an A64 chip one running 32bit edition and one 64bit edition of xp there is really no difference in some cases the 32bit edition is quicker. I understand the chip has potential Microsoft just needs to work on the 64bit edition, This CPU would fly with TurboLinux!!!!!

TurboLinux

What are you talking about? The 64bit version of windows XP M$ is giving away (a trial version none the less), is built SPECIFICALLY for A64s, only now has Intel finally released their 6xx line that can run the 64bit version of WinXP available to the masses. This past year or so Windows XP x64 was available ONLY to the Athlon 64, it was even listed as a requirement by M$. Now, obviously, the new 6xx P4s can fulfill that requirement.

The reason "Windows XP x64" doesn't run 100% on any system is due to lack of driver support, which should really start kicking up soon, especially since we're nearing a final release of XP x64.

 

[gobucks]

I've seen linux apps in 64-bit looking a lot more promising than their windows counterparts. Many apps average a 20% improvement over 32 bit. I have no doubt that the same potential is there for windows. The problem is an issue of effort. Linux is written by geeks, for geeks (no offense to anyone, as I'm a geek, too). Linux geeks with 64 bit chips likely put lots of effort into making their 64 bit apps run great, and taking full advantage of the new capabilities. Theres is also no shortage of manpower to make this software, as linux developers are doing it for FUN. As a result, 64-bit linux is great. Windows on the other hand, is written by a corporation, for the market that will make it the most money. The market is 99% 32-bit right now, so 99% of microsoft's efforts are devoted to 32-bit windows and plugging all the security holes therein. Since microsoft is a company, they have limited resources, and when 32-bit windows has a problem, people get taken off the 64-bit project to help fix the 32-bit product. Plus, driver support is the same way. ATI's drivers didn't exist for a long time, and even now they are beta. When Intel starts moving more 6xx processors, expect development to take more of a priority, and performance to go up.

 

[Rock Hydra]

Well, If it's speed/fps increases you're wanting, you might not find what you're looking for, or maybe just modest gains.
I think the 64 bit extensions in games will help things like draw distances, more advanced physics engines that don't tax the CPU as much, running dedicated game servers, other possibilities and cool effects that haven't been practical in a 32 bit environment.