Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Windows XP 64-Bit Customer Preview Program

Posted by michael on from the bleeding-edge-pain dept.

MBCook writes "I just notice that Microsoft has a new Windows XP 64-Bit Customer Preview Program starting today (February 3rd). If you have a AMD Opteron or Athlon64, you can go to the download page to get your copy. It's a pre-release copy that will expire in 360 days (which probably means the final will be out by then). Now Intel just changed their 64-bit plans, and all of a sudden this appears. Speculate away!"

3 of 417 comments (clear)

  1. Actual Performance Difference by neomage86 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I wonder if a 64 bit OS will make any performance difference for the average desktop user. Since its not like any normal people have more than a gig of ram anyways. Is it possible that it could even slow down 32 bit apps?

    1. Re:Actual Performance Difference by Miguelito · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Well I did some benchmarks using openssl's built in speed tests, and running in 64 bit vs 32 bit made a HUGE difference. Of course that was running a 64bit openssl as well. The opterons I have access to even beat the Itanium2s I have access to at work. By a lot in the smaller bit key sizes, but still either tied or beat the ia64 in the larger key sizes.

      Here are the charts I made in OpenOffice on the data I collected. Even a 2GHz opteron beat a 3.2Ghz Xeon in 32 bit mode. :)

      Of course this was just a benchmark, but it does show that things that use openssl would benefit from running under 64bit on an opteron.

      --
      - My favorite error message: xscreensaver, running on an old Sparc 5 w/ 8bit color: bsod: Couldn't allocate color Blue
  2. Intel will have to follow AMD by Random+BedHead+Ed · · Score: 5, Interesting
    At this point there's enough Opteron stuff out there that Intel can't avoid implementing an architecture compatible with amd64. Yes, I think the timing is probably not a coincidence. Though I'm sure Microsoft wasn't waiting for Intel, they probably informed Groves and Co. of the release in advance.

    If Intel can't stay compatible with AMD's lineup they could end up behind. That would certainly be a first for Intel.