32bit vs 64bit machines
Ok...another dumb question before I either upgrade current computer or go new. Decided this should be separate from my other post. Currently have a 2008 HP Pavillion Desktop running Vista Home P...
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covetsthesun wrote:
What is the real difference between 32bit and 64 bit machines?
thx
cts
As stated below, the pragmatic, noticeable difference is the amount of memory that can be *directly* used by the computer. More is better. Also, most chips are 64 bits so again, pragmatically, you don't worry too much about it.
If you're feeling a bit nerdy, the number 64, 32, 16, 8 (we skipped 24 in the Intel world) has to do with the number of bits that the chip can store and process internally. Again, more is better.
The more bits a chip can deal with internally, the less bites it needs to take to get info from it's memory and the bigger the numbers it can handle.
With *gross oversimplification* the largest number an 8 bit CPU could handle internally was 255. A 16 bit chip could go up to 65,535. A 32 bit machine can do a bit above 4 billion, and a 64 bit chip can do, well, a very big number.
