Windows 7 32-bit Enterprise and PAE

[beginner99]

Kind of confused about PAE. i've googled but got no 100% clear answer. What i deduced is that PAE is only available on Windows 32-bit Server editions but not on any desktop Version?

with PAE i mean the actual ability to use more than 3 GB of RAM and no not as a RAMDISK or other trick.

My company is upgrading to 32-bit only and for me that has and will be very limiting fro my work. I actually thought it will be no issue because of PAE but I seem to be wrong? (IT told me so, that more than 4 gb is useless)

Does anyone else here think this isc completely moronic? The claim it's for legacy support but then is there any 32-bit apps that don't run on Wind 7 64-bit? AFAIk that was an issue like over 5years ago but has been 100% resolved by now...Have the feeling some stupid manager with no clue made that decision.

 

[Ancalagon44]

The only apps that would not run would be stuff at least 15 years old. 16 bit apps would not run. If you are still using 16 bit apps you deserve to be shut down!

I havent heard much about PAE, but as far as I understand, its a very inelegant and problematic solution to the problem of address space. You would be far better served going 64 bit, but then it sounds like you already know that.

Tell them to upgrade to Win7 64 bit and use Windows XP mode, which I think provides 32 bit Win XP virtualization. If it doesnt run in Win XP mode, you have no business using Win7 at all, 32 or 64 bit.

EDIT:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Physical_Address_Extension

Microsoft Windows implements PAE if booted with the appropriate option, but current 32-bit desktop editions enforce the physical address space within 4 GB even in PAE mode. According to Geoff Chappell, Microsoft limits 32-bit versions of Windows to 4 GB as a matter of its licensing policy,[2] and Microsoft Technical Fellow Mark Russinovich says that some drivers were found to be unstable when encountering physical addresses above 4 GB.[3]

 

[beginner99]

The only apps that would not run would be stuff at least 15 years old. 16 bit apps would not run. If you are still using 16 bit apps you deserve to be shut down!

well the company is pretty big so I have no idea what kind of apps are out there but 15 years, hm would not surprise me at all. One of the core desktop apps (core in terms of what the company makes not how many use it) has a GUI that looks very 90ties to me. I don't use it nor have access to it but have seen it.

On another occasion I once saw a someone entering data into a rather important database system using a DOS(CMD) window and arrow keys for navigation between columns. You get the point...

 

[Viper GTS]

Your research is correct, only server OSes get the option of 4 GB+ on 32-bit. It works great in Windows Server 2003 Enterprise and above. For anything 2008 R2 and above it's essentially a non-issue since 32-bit is no longer.

7 x64 is what you need. You should be able to make the business case that you need more than 4 GB of RAM. When top end cell phones have 2 GB there is something seriously wrong with an IT organization if they think 4 GB is sufficient for power users on the desktop.

Viper GTS

 

[Nothinman]

well the company is pretty big so I have no idea what kind of apps are out there but 15 years, hm would not surprise me at all. One of the core desktop apps (core in terms of what the company makes not how many use it) has a GUI that looks very 90ties to me. I don't use it nor have access to it but have seen it.

On another occasion I once saw a someone entering data into a rather important database system using a DOS(CMD) window and arrow keys for navigation between columns. You get the point...

Neither of those really mean much. I've seen some pretty shitty looking "enterprise" apps that look like they're from the Win 3.11 days, you would need to look at the binary to tell if it's 16-bit or not.

And a DOS/CMD window doesn't mean much either, it could simply be a telnet/ssh session into a mainframe or unix system and not a local, DOS app.

Your IT dept should look at XP mode or VMware Workstation's Unity mode for those legacy apps, it's not 100% seamless but it works well enough.

 

[hhhd1]

Why would they need to have either 32 on all pcs, or 64 on all pcs ?

What the problem of having some pcs be 32 bits, and some other 64 bits ?

 

[Nothinman]

Why would they need to have either 32 on all pcs, or 64 on all pcs ?

What the problem of having some pcs be 32 bits, and some other 64 bits ?

Print drivers? Consistent policy?

 

[dawks]

Print drivers? Consistent policy?

Yup, drivers/compatibility/standardization are really the only reasons, but at this point, they are pretty sad reasons and difficult to justify.

64bit is typically more secure (changes to kernel design), also you could argue more stable (though 32bit NT is remarkably stable) and can support more ram, and higher memory per app. On 32bit, not only are you limited to '4'gigs, but each application is also limited to 2gigs (per process), which can cause issues on some larger programs, and larger data sets.

And yes, most 64bit compatibility has been worked out for a few years now. Windows XP was the first to introduce support for 64bit, but it was an after thought. Vista built it in from the beginning, and Windows 7 perfected it. And as stated, I believe starting with Server 2008 R2 and on, you can only get 64bit. SQL and Exchange are now 64bit only as well. "First and foremost, 32-bit is done. History. Archives. Windows Server 2008 R2 is the first Windows OS platform to go 64-bit only, and frankly it was high time."

http://blogs.technet.com/b/windowsserver/archive/2008/10/28/announcing-windows-server-2008-r2.aspx

 

[beginner99]

Print drivers? Consistent policy?

I rather guess a high level manager who read a white paper 6 years ago claiming 64-bit XP has issues with 32-bit compatibility and somehow still remembered that.

 

[Nothinman]

I rather guess a high level manager who read a white paper 6 years ago claiming 64-bit XP has issues with 32-bit compatibility and somehow still remembered that.

And?

 

[TheKub]

I rather guess a high level manager who read a white paper 6 years ago claiming 64-bit XP has issues with 32-bit compatibility and somehow still remembered that.

Its certainly a reason many stupid things happen with IT in business.

 

[xSauronx]

Print drivers?

bane of my existence. sometimes its very easy to get both 32 bit and 64 bit drivers working on a server, sometimes i want to go office space on a printer trying to get it to work

 

[Nothinman]

bane of my existence. sometimes its very easy to get both 32 bit and 64 bit drivers working on a server, sometimes i want to go office space on a printer trying to get it to work

Exactly and it just takes 1 to ruin the whole thing. You could have 20 printers working fine and 1 funky driver will randomly crash the spooler, cause STOP errors on the server, etc and that's hard as hell to debug. But that applies to 32-bit drivers just as much as 64-bit ones.

 

[Chiropteran]

Exactly and it just takes 1 to ruin the whole thing. You could have 20 printers working fine and 1 funky driver will randomly crash the spooler, cause STOP errors on the server, etc and that's hard as hell to debug. But that applies to 32-bit drivers just as much as 64-bit ones.

I'm confused why this is an issue. As you said yourself, that is not a problem unique to 64 bit drivers. There is no need to install 64 bit drivers on EVERY SINGLE PRINTER, you can control printer access and allow 64 bit users access to only a subset of printers, and only those printers need drivers.

 

[Nothinman]

I'm confused why this is an issue. As you said yourself, that is not a problem unique to 64 bit drivers. There is no need to install 64 bit drivers on EVERY SINGLE PRINTER, you can control printer access and allow 64 bit users access to only a subset of printers, and only those printers need drivers.

Because if you have a mix of 32-bit and 64-bit clients you do need 64-bit drivers for every single printer, unless you restrict certain departments to only 32-bit Windows. But no, I don't think that alone is reason enough to stick with all 32-bit Windows unless your company is dependent on a printer that doesn't have 64-bit drivers and you can't replace, update, etc the thing.

 

[yinan]

Then make a print server VM for the ones that dont play well with others, it is not that hard..

 

[Nothinman]

Then make a print server VM for the ones that dont play well with others, it is not that hard..

What about places without VM infrastructure in place? What about Windows licensing for the new VM? It's not as simple as just "make a print server VM."

 

[beginner99]

I've found out that there is some very old 16-bit stuff some people still use** To reduce ***plexity it was decided to use 32-bit only** And ***plexity is defined as having 12 instead of 6 images for installing Windows** Why 6? well because you can only choose between 6 pc/laptop models or you don't get any support at all**

One can say 4 Gb is enough but even for a moderate user more RAM can be useful with win 7 (superfetch******)** I need to mention that the email client is Lotus Notes which is an extreme resource hog, especially for what it does**