Memory usage beyond 32Bit limitations of Windows OS

By JunkMail
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Grand Master

Prince Charming

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I would like to stress again, that on Windows XP x64 (excluding the IA-64 version), Windows Vista x64, and Windows 7 x64, WOW64 IS NOT EMUALTION. The processor is switched into 32bit compatibility mode and the 32bit thread is executed in 32bit mode. The only time WOW64 ever emulates, is when running x86 instructions on IA-64 editions of Windows. I'm fairly sure none of you are using IA-64 processors (Itanium 2), so the issue is entirely moot.

Grand Master

notuptome2004

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The biggest disadvantage is availability of Softwares (which is big) and some hardware drivers ( sad for that dude without TV tuner drivers). Windows XP x64 uses a compatability layer called WOW64, to emulate a 32bit Operating System. (Source here). Without WOW, you can't operate 32Bit apps :p not sure about Win7 though. Again selection of 32/64Bit is a user preference and cannot be forced. As long as there are users willing to use x86, MS will continue to release x86 of Win7 and Win8 and Win9.

Big deal, MS uses professional term for it's artificial means "WOW" (also GBs for wow files) and I don't :p I'm addressing main problem, "RAM usage" if I choose 64BIT of XP, I'll have to address "slow buggy 32Bit usage".

windows 7 64bit runs WOW64 also and you can run any 32bit program you want and so what if ther is not as many 64bit apps as 32bit they still run on windows 7 64bit just fine and as for hardware well compatibility rate is almost nothing now i would assume the guy with the TV tuner has an old ass one from 2002 or something so that is a NON issue. and WOW64 has no overhead at all not today, and also right now winows 7 RC is FREE to use till march of 2010 so going 64bit is FREE

oh windows XP X64 is not that good so i would not use it that is why microsoft hardly acknowledge it today

Grand Master

ToneKnee

Posted
Posted

There is a reason why we have a pagefile, and that's for memory redundancy. Windows needs to expand the pagefile depending on usage. So if you have 4GB's of memory and you dedicate 512MB's to it, then Windows will only have 512MB's of pagefile space to work with. My pagefile is at 5GB's at the moment and I have 8GB's of memory, and my computer runs ridiculously fast.

What you are suggesting offers no one any improvements and you are only joking yourself. If someone has 4GB's of memory or more, they can go to x64 without any problems. And like Pandya pointed out, WOW64 is not an emulation layer, but it's just a compatibility mode which has nearly 0% overhead.

To everyone who thinks this will benefit them, it won't, and you will get better "performance" just by going to x64, not just by the extra RAM which will be available to you (if you have 4GB's or more), but the extra CPU instructions and extra security.

JunkMail is misleading people and his suggestion should be avoided.

Grand Master

ToneKnee

Posted
Posted
The biggest disadvantage is availability of Softwares (which is big) and some hardware drivers ( sad for that dude without TV tuner drivers). Windows XP x64 uses a compatability layer called WOW64, to emulate a 32bit Operating System. (Source here). Without WOW, you can't operate 32Bit apps :p not sure about Win7 though. Again selection of 32/64Bit is a user preference and cannot be forced. As long as there are users willing to use x86, MS will continue to release x86 of Win7 and Win8 and Win9.

Big deal, MS uses professional term for it's artificial means "WOW" (also GBs for wow files) and I don't :p I'm addressing main problem, "RAM usage" if I choose 64BIT of XP, I'll have to address "slow buggy 32Bit usage".

This is where you are wrong. Microsoft will force the upgrade, just like they forced Windows 32-bit, and they needed to do that to expand the hardware requirements that was needed. While we might not be there yet, it's much easier to start the transition earlier so that when it comes to software/hardware that requires x64, they can do it without much problem.

RAM is dirt cheap, software is getting bigger, and there are programs which are x64 and will easily eat 8GB's of RAM easily (think video editing). Even in x64, a pagefile or swap partition will still be needed, just incase a program has a memory leak, you can spot the problem before your system crashes.

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JunkMail

Posted
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Windows cannot expand pagefile beyond limitations set by administrator and what good is a pagefile for a system with too much RAM? its a space hog (I turned it off ages back) :D Pandya pointed out WOW64 is NOT an emulation layer :p

Anyone using 32Bit Apps on 64Bit OS with WOW emulation, will get the same overhead as of putting RamDisk on Ram :p

People are smart and know what information is misleading, hehe you and me cannot mislead anyone smart :p

This is where you are wrong. Microsoft will force the upgrade, just like they forced Windows 32-bit, and they needed to do that to expand the hardware requirements that was needed. While we might not be there yet, it's much easier to start the transition earlier so that when it comes to software/hardware that requires x64, they can do it without much problem.

RAM is dirt cheap, software is getting bigger, and there are programs which are x64 and will easily eat 8GB's of RAM easily (think video editing). Even in x64, a pagefile or swap partition will still be needed, just incase a program has a memory leak, you can spot the problem before your system crashes.

Well I don't see MS forcing us to use x64 for 5+ years (Unless Microsoft want to hit hammer on his toe and want users to run away). Its obvious Microsoft wants you to keep on buying new hardware and incur more costs but people are smart. You're making 64Bit a big hype its not that important for home users

I would never want nasty memory hogging softwares in my system but if a single light weight software wants to access more memory beyond i know, 64Bit is NOT a must after this solution :p PageFile is on RAM but if that is low, users can always add more pagefiles to hard disk (will this solve your memory leaking crap?)

Edited by JunkMail
Grand Master

hdood

Posted
Posted
I would like to stress again, that on Windows XP x64 (excluding the IA-64 version), Windows Vista x64, and Windows 7 x64, WOW64 IS NOT EMUALTION. The processor is switched into 32bit compatibility mode and the 32bit thread is executed in 32bit mode. The only time WOW64 ever emulates, is when running x86 instructions on IA-64 editions of Windows. I'm fairly sure none of you are using IA-64 processors (Itanium 2), so the issue is entirely moot.

What you're missing is that there is a lot more to running 32-bit software than simply executing instructions. This is something we've been through a billion times before.

WOW64 emulates the 32-bit kernel (internally by providing thunks for the kernel and kernel-mode functions (like most of Win32)).

WOW64 emulates the 32-bit Windows environment (internally by running the 32-bit NT API (ie ntdll) and all 32-bit system libraries on top of the emulated kernel.)

WOW64 emulates the 32-bit registry (internally by redirecting or reflecting the calls to places in the 64-bit registry.)

WOW64 emulates the 32-bit file system (internally by redirecting calls to places in the 64-bit file system.)

All in all it only amounts to a few percent overhead, and isn't a good excuse not to go 64-bit (the benefits of doing so may even cancel out the overhead).

What you are suggesting offers no one any improvements and you are only joking yourself.

[...]

JunkMail is misleading people and his suggestion should be avoided.

Why do you lie? If someone insists on running a 32-bit OS, then JunkMail's suggestion DOES offer improvements. You may not personally like it, but it's a fact. People would be better off going 64-bit, but it's still a fact.

Community Regular

JunkMail

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irc is fast and jumping over keyboard won't get you beating satisfaction (slower is better for this type of topic)

There was a reason why I mentioned (64Bit users get out) in the sub-title of this topic :) (its not to insult 64 bit users but to make 32bit users comfortable)

Edited by JunkMail
Grand Master

Subject Delta

Posted
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Windows cannot expand pagefile beyond limitations set by administrator and what good is a pagefile for a system with too much RAM? its a space hog (I turned it off ages back) :D Pandya pointed out WOW64 is NOT an emulation layer :p

Anyone using 32Bit Apps on 64Bit OS with WOW emulation, will get the same overhead as of putting RamDisk on Ram :p

No they won't because placing a ramdisk into your ram seriously reduces the effectiveness of superfetch.

If you want to use more RAM than 3GB, then use 64Bit OS?

Yes

or install RamDisk plus + set pagefile path to it?

No. That is an utterly ridiculous suggestion that would offer no performance benifits at all. Not to mention running a ramdisk still wouldn't make the OS address more than the 4GB limit without PAE enabled.

You guys are just jealous because his ideas are better than yours.

:laugh: thats absurd. I run Windows 7 X64 with 8GB of ram and it runs slick as anything, I don't need Junkmail's ideas because whatever way you cut it, even if I did run a ramdisk application, I would still lose 4 gigs of my memory in X86 windows without enabling PAE

Grand Master

hdood

Posted
Posted

The point, Frank and Tony, is that if you have a 32-bit OS and, say, 6GB RAM, you'll only be able to use 3.25 of it directly. The rest will be completely useless and just sit there. With a RAM disk driver, you can use the other 2.75GB as a RAM disk, which is at least better than nothing (although spending $50 on the software is a bit silly).

It might be a bit silly, but it's perfectly possible. So why be so damn hard on JunkMail?

Grand Master

x-byte

Posted
Posted
The point, Frank and Tony, is that if you have a 32-bit OS and, say, 6GB RAM, you'll only be able to use 3.25 of it directly. The rest will be completely useless and just sit there. With a RAM disk driver, you can use the other 2.75GB as a RAM disk, which is at least better than nothing (although spending $50 on the software is a bit silly).

It might be a bit silly, but it's perfectly possible. So why be so damn hard on JunkMail?

Because this is a hardware limit, not software.

Grand Master

+Warwagon MVC

Posted
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I just don't see why people don't upgrade to 64 bit. I mean the only reason not to is if you use 16 bit applications. Even then those can be used in a VM. Personally i've been on 64bit for 2 years and I have yet to find an application which doesn't work.

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