32-bit vs 64-bit: Performance

Message

Dagger · Post by **Dagger** » Wed Oct 10, 2007 11:47 am

for me performance is the same (some things are faster on 32bit, some on 64bit).
I dont have any problems with 64bit (of course except java support in firefox).
Sooner or later everything will be running (at least) 64bit, so its better to get familiar with it sooner.
You can always have 32bit libraries for more stubborn programs (read 32bit-bin ones)

Roman_Gruber · Post by **Roman_Gruber** » Wed Oct 10, 2007 11:49 am

Nephilim666 wrote:I cannot comment on any speed difference, but I have no troubles using the 64bit version.
Everything is fine and dandy as long as you take the multilib profile and firefox-bin, if you need flash in your browser.

And since I got a 64bit cpu why shouldn't i make use of it?

Cheers!

Firefox with netscape flash also works. You don*t need the binary version.

Roman_Gruber · Post by **Roman_Gruber** » Wed Oct 10, 2007 11:50 am

Some games only work with 32 bit. There are only 32 bit ebuilds like Duke Nukem, ...

Nephilim666 · Post by **Nephilim666** » Wed Oct 10, 2007 11:51 am

tw04l124 wrote: Firefox with netscape flash also works. You don*t need the binary version.

Oh, it does? Thanks for making me aware!

Cyker · Post by **Cyker** » Thu Oct 11, 2007 7:31 am

Nephilim666 wrote:And since I got a 64bit cpu why shouldn't i make use of it?

My lappy has a TPM module but I don't use that either

At the moment, 64-bits is as almost good as 32-bit AS LONG as you don't have to do anything thats 32-bit.
The Emul 32-bit compatibility libraries work, but not with everything.

If you have ANY need whatsoever to touch any 32-bit binaries, save yourself any extra potential hassle and stick with 32-bit.

If you don't (i.e. Everything you need is source-compileable into a 64-bit exe), or you need to access 4GB+ RAM and/or do masses of number crunching, 64-bits is the way forward

nixnut · Post by **nixnut** » Thu Oct 11, 2007 7:49 pm

merged above three posts here.

Vendicatore · Post by **Vendicatore** » Mon Oct 22, 2007 7:19 am

I'm using 64bit gentoo since 2 years ago.
I'm not having particular issues with it, and 32bit apps run really smooth.
About the performance: a lot of software is almost equal in 32 or 64bit environment, but the performance increase is evident if you using apps using heavy math calculations (applying filters on large images in Gimp for example).
But I never seen performance loss on any software.

Drewgrange · Post by **Drewgrange** » Mon Oct 29, 2007 6:24 pm

I'm getting my new Core2 from newegg tomorrow and would like a little clarification,,

Can 32-bit programs be run under 64 bit gentoo, as long as you have the proper emulation libraries?

My main concerns are moneydance, firefox w/ flash, and games (I plan on buying UT3 as soon as it's out/there are linux binaries). It looks like people have gotten firefox w/ flash working using emulation libraries, should the other two work as well?

If it's significantly easier to just go 32-bit I guess I will do that, but I would rather not if I don't have to, as I'd have to eventually reinstall when 64-bit becomes more prevalent.

NeoWolf · Post by **NeoWolf** » Mon Oct 29, 2007 6:42 pm

Drewgrange wrote:I'm getting my new Core2 from newegg tomorrow and would like a little clarification,,

Can 32-bit programs be run under 64 bit gentoo, as long as you have the proper emulation libraries?

My main concerns are moneydance, firefox w/ flash, and games (I plan on buying UT3 as soon as it's out/there are linux binaries). It looks like people have gotten firefox w/ flash working using emulation libraries, should the other two work as well?

If it's significantly easier to just go 32-bit I guess I will do that, but I would rather not if I don't have to, as I'd have to eventually reinstall when 64-bit becomes more prevalent.

Firefox and flash can work one of two ways. You can either use firefox-bin for a 32-bit browser to go with your 32-bit flash or use nspluginwrapper to use 32-bit flash in a 64-bit browser. Games are no problem for the most part too. I can report success with NWN and a host of games in WINE.

Cyker · Post by **Cyker** » Mon Oct 29, 2007 8:07 pm

Drewgrange wrote:I'm getting my new Core2 from newegg tomorrow and would like a little clarification,,

Can 32-bit programs be run under 64 bit gentoo, as long as you have the proper emulation libraries?

My main concerns are moneydance, firefox w/ flash, and games (I plan on buying UT3 as soon as it's out/there are linux binaries). It looks like people have gotten firefox w/ flash working using emulation libraries, should the other two work as well?

If it's significantly easier to just go 32-bit I guess I will do that, but I would rather not if I don't have to, as I'd have to eventually reinstall when 64-bit becomes more prevalent.

64-bit mode in Gentoo is good enough to be called 'mature' now.

I would say (pulling an arbitrary statistic out of my ass), that in 64-bit mode you have 95% 32-bit compatibility.

32-bit mode is obviously easier, because you don't have to 'do' anything - It just works.

32-on-64-bit mode has hoops; However, if you STICK WITH PORTAGE ONLY for installing 32-bit software, it will handle all of the hoops for you for 95% of programs.
If you need anything in 32-bit that isn't handled by Portage you're into the scary world of system-in-a-system chroots and/or cross compiling.

If you don't hand-compile anything, ever, and only have a tiny set of 32-bit stuff (Which you know will work in 64-bit Gentoo), then go with 64-bit. You already state you will goto 64-bit eventually so you may as well do it now. It might be a bit more work than 32-bit initially, but it's better to get that out the way now.

32-bit mode is better for people like me who have no use for 64-bits, but have a lot of old 32-bit stuff, and also use a fair few commercial binaries (Games like UT, NWN; Apps like RAR, Opera, fluent, etc.).

Drewgrange · Post by **Drewgrange** » Mon Oct 29, 2007 10:32 pm

Thanks guys, I think I'm going to go with 64 bit. If it causes too many problems, it shouldn't take too long to reinstall things with my new processor

Sounds like everything will work. I'm still a little worried about games, but NeoWolf says NWN works, and I guess nobody knows if UT3 will work until it comes out.

NeoWolf · Post by **NeoWolf** » Mon Oct 29, 2007 11:49 pm

Drewgrange wrote:Thanks guys, I think I'm going to go with 64 bit. If it causes too many problems, it shouldn't take too long to reinstall things with my new processor

Sounds like everything will work. I'm still a little worried about games, but NeoWolf says NWN works, and I guess nobody knows if UT3 will work until it comes out.

That was the basic attitude I went in with and have no regrets over~

Cyker · Post by **Cyker** » Tue Oct 30, 2007 12:47 am

Drewgrange wrote:...NeoWolf says NWN works, and I guess nobody knows if UT3 will work until it comes out.

Hey Neowolf; Is this NWN under Wine or native Linux NWN with emul-x86 libraries?

NeoWolf · Post by **NeoWolf** » Tue Oct 30, 2007 12:51 am

Cyker wrote:
Drewgrange wrote:...NeoWolf says NWN works, and I guess nobody knows if UT3 will work until it comes out.
Hey Neowolf; Is this NWN under Wine or native Linux NWN with emul-x86 libraries?

emul-x86. Haven't tried it in WINE.

Donkey_Breath · Post by **Donkey_Breath** » Mon Nov 12, 2007 10:45 am

Drewgrange wrote: I guess nobody knows if UT3 will work until it comes out.

That's true. I'm hoping they continue with the good start they made, releasing native amd64 binaries for ut2004.

References to that seem to be quickly disappearing from google, so I'll write here that to use the native files, install the megapack, go to /opt/ut2004/System (or wherever it is installed on your system), and replace ucc-bin and ut2004-bin with ucc-bin-linux-amd64 and ut2004-bin-linux-amd64 respectively.

The main difference it made on my system was that maps load a LOT faster, framerates are close enough together that there's effectively no difference, but as was posted on icculus.org (2004-02-15):

The compiler isn't as mature as it's 32-bit counterparts, the drivers aren't as mature, we didn't include some SSE code you'd find in 32-bit versions, etc...the game is fast, but it probably won't edge out other builds at this point. This is a tech demo, really.