Windows 7 x86 or x64?

Greetings folks, I will go straight to the point, I have always used 32-bit operating systems (x86) but lately I've considered making the leap to 64bit.
My fear of change to 64bit lies in 2 factors, "loss of performance and compatibility issues."

-I would like some opinions based on your own experiences on the subject, I mainly use the PC for, games, video editing (Adobe ® Premier), image editing (Adobe ® Photoshop), reproduction of A/V and office .

Info of my PC for reference.
CPU: Q6600@3.2
RAM: 3Gb
GPU: SLI GTX 260

In advance thanks to those who respond.

 

There is no loss in performance. Only gain in performance but that's only if you have 3.2 GB + of RAM because a 32-Bit OS cannot utilize more than 3.2 GB even if you have more installed.

SO my advice to you is, unless you are planning on upgrading your RAM to 4 GB or preferable 8 GB, don't bother and save yourself the hassle because you will need to find 64-Bit drivers for many of your hardware.

It is easy for many laptops to get them from their manufacturer site but why go through all this hassle when you will not see any benefits?

compatibility wise, most apps that are not written specificall for a 64-bit OS will install separately in a folder named C:\Program Files (x86) and your 64 Bit written apps will go to the usual C:\Program Files folder

I have yet to see a single app that works on the 32-Bit version of Windows 7 that doesn't work on the 64-Bit version.

Also make sure to get a 64-Bit AntiVirus edition, many popular AV companies offer both flavors nowadays.

Good luck

 

There is a 90 day trial of Windows 7 Enterprise that you can use to test both the 32 bit and 64 bit OS before purchasing. If you have enough hard drive space to setup a dual (or multi) boot scenario, then that would be the easiest way to test it. There is a link to the trial here (right side of the page):
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/dd361745.aspx

You can check your software against the Windows 7 compatibility site here to see if there are any issues:
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/compatibility/windows-7/en-us/default.aspx

David
Windows Outreach Team - IT Pro