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Vista OEM or retail...

A

AndyKH

Member
OK here it goes:

I'm of the impression that when buying a OEM version of Vista Ultimate, you only get either the 32 or the 64 bit version, while you get both when buying retail - and that when buying anything else than ultimate you also only get one version. However, I haven't found any links to definitive proof. What is correct?

When buying a copy of Vista ultimate, do you get to install both the 32 bit version and the 64 bit version on the same computer?

Thanks in advance
 
You're pretty much correct; the OEM versions include one disc, Ultimate retail includes both and all other flavors come as 32 bit only, but for $10 and filling a form out online, MS will ship you a 64 bit disc for any retail version.

You can install 32 and 64 bit on the same computer but, if I got this right, you can only run one at a time. It is a violation of the EULA to run 32 bit on one computer and 64 on another. Both use the same product key so you would probably encounter activation problems doing this anyway.
 
Thanks for the answer. If only Ultimate retail wasn't so damn expensive in Denmark: Ultimate retail costs what amounts to ~$700 - quite a bit more expensive than the $400 in the US. Some of it can be attributed to the high VAT and other taxes used to finace our little socialist wannabe paradise 😀, but some of it is just higher pricing by Microsoft.
 
If I buy a retail Home Premium UPGRADE 32bit disc, can I pay this $10 for a 64bit Home Premium UPGRADE? or does this only apply to full installation purchases?

Many thanks
 
I just ordered the 64 Bit OEM version of Vista home premium ... was cheaper than the 32b bit version too.
 
Originally posted by: Techno Pride
If I buy a retail Home Premium UPGRADE 32bit disc, can I pay this $10 for a 64bit Home Premium UPGRADE? or does this only apply to full installation purchases?

Many thanks
Click to expand...

Yes, the 32-bit DVD covers all 32-bit retail versions (full & upgrade) of Vista and the 64-bit DVD covers all retail 64-bit versions of Vista.

All you have to do is go HERE and enter your Vista key and place your order.
 
If you want both media center and shadow copies at the same time - both very valuable features.

I especially find shadow copies nice. It's not exactly the same as backups of your files as you wont be protected form a crashing hard drive, but it can perform the duties of a poor mans version control system.
 
Originally posted by: LuckyTaxi
still dont understand the point of running 64bit. most apps arent even 64bit ... yet. waste of money.
Click to expand...

There is more to Vista 64 bit than just being able to run 64 bit programs: The most important feature besides being 64 bit is the ability to handle lots of memory. If you install 4 GB RAM in Vista x86 or XP x86, you will not be able to use more than ~3.3 GB - the rest is lost. Also, with a 64 bit OS it's easier to get around the problem with the 2 GB virtual memory limit in 32 bit OSes. Granted you can change the limit, but that might result in instability.
 
Originally posted by: AndyKH
Originally posted by: LuckyTaxi
still dont understand the point of running 64bit. most apps arent even 64bit ... yet. waste of money.
Click to expand...

There is more to Vista 64 bit than just being able to run 64 bit programs: The most important feature besides being 64 bit is the ability to handle lots of memory. If you install 4 GB RAM in Vista x86 or XP x86, you will not be able to use more than ~3.3 GB - the rest is lost. Also, with a 64 bit OS it's easier to get around the problem with the 2 GB virtual memory limit in 32 bit OSes. Granted you can change the limit, but that might result in instability.
Click to expand...

In addition, IIRC from my old CS days (didn't pay the greatest of attention), 64-bit is inherently better at number crunching, which should translate in to better performance for things like audio/video encoding. Is that right?
 
Originally posted by: Gooberlx2
Originally posted by: AndyKH
Originally posted by: LuckyTaxi
still dont understand the point of running 64bit. most apps arent even 64bit ... yet. waste of money.
Click to expand...

There is more to Vista 64 bit than just being able to run 64 bit programs: The most important feature besides being 64 bit is the ability to handle lots of memory. If you install 4 GB RAM in Vista x86 or XP x86, you will not be able to use more than ~3.3 GB - the rest is lost. Also, with a 64 bit OS it's easier to get around the problem with the 2 GB virtual memory limit in 32 bit OSes. Granted you can change the limit, but that might result in instability.
Click to expand...

In addition, IIRC from my old CS days (didn't pay the greatest of attention), 64-bit is inherently better at number crunching, which should translate in to better performance for things like audio/video encoding. Is that right?
Click to expand...

Yes, that's right. For many applications you're just doing things like clearing
large memory regions to a specific value, or searching for data within a memory region,
etc. If you use 64 bit registers and memory operations it'll tend to go faster than issuing
twice as many 32 bit operations for the same kinds of tasks that need to operate on
large multiples of 32/64 bits worth of data.

Of course if you use 32 bit registers and your program occasionally needs 64 bit
integer precision e.g. an "long int" variable, it'll have to emulate the 64 bit arithmetic
checking for carry, etc. with several additional instruction steps and use
doubled-register source and destination encodings whereas with 64 bit native registers
it just does the operation in one simple instruction.

Of course there are things like SSE instructions to operate on wider or vector
data sets even under 32 bit execution mode for applications that benefit from
those. So in special cases like that or using FPU registers that are inherently
80 bit / 64 bit in double precision more there's less difference between operating
the main instruction set in x32 vs x64.

I just installed vista x64 on my PC with 8GB of memory and it's working more or less
nicely for both 32 bit mode and 64 bit mode programs so far... LINUX x64 still seems
a lot more powerful, though.

 
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