Educate me about modern PCs!

[Trixter]

I have a relevant question--if the motherboard supports a maximum of 4GB, is there any compelling reason to go to 64 bits? I run a mix of 64- and 32-bit applications, I'm hard put to see a substantial difference in performance. But then, I tend not to use heavy CPU hog programs.

64-bit programs on 64-bit architecture with a 64-bit OS have measurable speed improvements compared to, all things equal, 32-bit equivalents.

Note that measurable != noticeable. Noticeable depends on what you're doing. Because I work with media (sound, video, photos, scans) nearly every day and have done so for many years, the performance improvement was immediately apparent when I switched from 32-bit Vista to 64-bit Vistas on the same hardware.

32-bit vs. 64-bit has much less to do with capacity than performance. That being said, if your workload does not exceed 4G, you probably don't need a 64-bit setup. (But since it costs less than $300 to do so these days, you probably should anyway. A new PC in 2013 for $500 or less will last 5-10 years.)

 

[SpidersWeb]

One tiny reason to go with 64 on a 4Gb system - the memory from any dedicated graphics card is included in that 4Gb address space - so if you have a 256MB card, you'll only be able to use 3.75GB of memory. But of course if you're using on-board graphics, then you'd probably only get that anyway, so it doesn't matter.

Something else to consider is that 64 bit Windows does not allow unsigned or 32 bit drivers. So if using old hardware, make sure you can actually get the 64bit drivers. Also support for 16 bit applications is completely dropped (I didn't even know that was available in the first place).

 

[Agent Orange]

One tiny reason to go with 64 on a 4Gb system - the memory from any dedicated graphics card is included in that 4Gb address space - so if you have a 256MB card, you'll only be able to use 3.75GB of memory. But of course if you're using on-board graphics, then you'd probably only get that anyway, so it doesn't matter.

Something else to consider is that 64 bit Windows does not allow unsigned or 32 bit drivers. So if using old hardware, make sure you can actually get the 64bit drivers. Also support for 16 bit applications is completely dropped (I didn't even know that was available in the first place).

Not true. System memory, at least in 32-bit W7, is completely isolated from video memory. I ran XFX 5850's in CrossFire (1GB per card) for a long time and always saw about 3.7 GB system memory. Any number of built-in system tests will verify how much system memory you have available.

 

[Agent Orange]

Facattack:

If it were me, I wouldn't spend one nickel on that system. Performance-wise, you are already way behind the curve with that old Dell setup and the Pentium 4. One thing you really need to watch out for is that Dell had their own P/S wiring schemes back then and many new mobo upgrades were smoked because of that compatiblity issue. Your best bet is to check Fry's, TigerDirect, MicroCenter, and Newegg for at least a "bundle" deal. Or save up a little for a "bare bones" offering. Trixter is giving you some real good advice.

 

[Unknown_K]

Newer systems are cheap but you get stcuk with those slimline designs that don't have the room or the power to drive a PCIE gaming card. The mid tower with expansion and better power supplies cost more money. Newegg has some decent deals on bare bones systems and they have a great selection of current gaming video cards.

I would ditch the P4 machine (use it for something else). I don't realy play anything current, my "newest" game machine is an AM2 64x2 5200+ Asus board with 4GB DDR2 (4x1GB) and an old Nvidia 8800GS video card running Windows 7 32bit.

The issues I have with older boards are the cheap ones have 2 RAM slots so getting over 4GB of DDR2 is kind of a pain, DDR3 is pretty cheap and 16GB of RAM is easy to do if you need that much. 4+ cores are also nice but older games don't do much with more then 2 anyway.

 

[SpidersWeb]

Not true. System memory, at least in 32-bit W7, is completely isolated from video memory. I ran XFX 5850's in CrossFire (1GB per card) for a long time and always saw about 3.7 GB system memory. Any number of built-in system tests will verify how much system memory you have available.

I had to do some google work to re-check my memory. I was a bit off. Apparently it reserves 256Mb for system resources - so 3.75Gb RAM free on a 4Gb system (rather than all video memory). When we upgraded those systems to 64, we had 4Gb available.