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Microsoft to Launch 64-bit Windows on Monday
maotx writes "Several news outlets are reporting that Microsoft will officially roll out 64-bit versions of its Windows operating systems on Monday. As compared with existing 32-bit versions: 64-bit Windows will handle 16 terabytes of virtual memory, as compared to 4 GB for 32-bit Windows. System cache size jumps from 1 GB to 1 TB, and paging-file size increases from 16 TB to 512 TB."
640k ought to be enough for anybody.
> paging-file size increases from 16 TB to 512 TB
:)
Hope that's a maximum, not required
It still has Solitaire, right?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Signature_bloc
64-bit Windows will handle 16 terabytes of virtual memory, as compared to 4 GB for 32-bit Windows.
16 terabytes! That oughta be enough for anybody!
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Just wondering. Obviously Solaris, IRIX, Linux, AIX, Mac OS X and whatever other UNIX flavors are out there (well, except for maybe SCO...) have had 64-bit support for some number of years now.
:)
Is Windows the last major commercial OS to add 64-bit support, or are there others I'm missing?
(Even if it is the last one, I'm sure Microsoft will tout this as supremely innovative.
Village idiot in some extremely smart villages.
They have caught up with Ninendo64!
seems nice, fast, haven't had any BSOD. The only problem, not many 32 bit apps run for me. You MUST run IE, WMP, etc. Windows 64
Save a Life. Donate Blood. Please.
Mmm... well sort of. AFAIK, Tiger isn't fully 64bit. The only thing that is 64 bit in Tiger is its support for 64 memory for POSIX based apps...(Command line apps; server daemons and such) Tigers kernel will reside in 32 bit address space so that it can still run on the G3 and G4. XPx64 is fully 64 and as such can only run on the x64 architecture and is by no mean a patch up job.
My 3D Texturing Skinning work (under construction)
...has somuch more useless information that you need a dual monitor set up just to read it.
BlackNova Traders
64-bit Windows has been available for Itanium for several years now.
MS: "We finally have a 64-Bit version of Windows. Page file and virtual memory sizes have increased substantially. In recognition of this, all native Windows apps and all new releases of Office, Visual Studio .Net, and other core Microsoft products will be quickly bloated to take full advantage of these new sizes!"
I've been messing around with Ubuntu for x86-64 lately and while it is pretty snappy, I miss things a lot of the little things (like the flash plugin) that were never compiled for a 64 bit system.
Is Microsoft going to have a similar problem, in that it has a nice OS, but few apps to run on it?
Goatse alert!
Mod parent down
No sig for the moment.
Microsoft also provided 64-bit Windows NT for Sparc. However, this is their up-to-date operating system ported to a 64-bit arch.
Do they release it because It Just Works?
This sig does not contain any SCO code.
It means we will be able to run "bloatware" such as Emacs without it constantly swapping!
The submission is absolutely misleading.
Windows Server 2003 has supported 64-bits (Enterprise Edition and Datacenter edition) since its launch on IA64(Itanium). Before that, they also had 64-bit versions of Windows 2000 Server.
Windows XP Professional also had a 64-bit version since 2003, again running on the Itanium. However, XP on Itanium was discontinued as no one was using it outside MS testing labs.
Whats gonna be launched are x64 editions of XP and 2003 Server.
Life is just a conviction.
We aren't talking quantum leaps in computing. . .
Actually, this is a quantum leap in computing. The leaps have gone in the sequence 4,8,16,32,64. I leave it as an exercise for the student to determine what the next quantum leap in the sequence might be.
Now, let's not always see the same hands.
MS simply made the jump a bit later than some.
AMD supplied the needed energy to jump to the next, ummmm, shell, by applying a cattle prod to their collective posteriors.
KFG
With kernel 2.6.11 I had no problem malloc()'ing 2^47 bytes (128TB) ! Memory overcommitting is on, of course. While it seems like an unneeded feature now, remember that W$ limitation means you cannot mmap() stuff >16TB, and this will be a painful limitation in a year or two (1TB IDE disks will soon be launched, I heard).
In addition, I was _really_ surprised to see that Intel's compiler still keeps "long" to 4 bytes on windows (didn't check, but so says their doc). With NO standard integer type for 64 bit, programming is set to be no fun on x86_64 under windows.
To try and take away the thunder from Mac OS X "Tiger".
DEC had 64 bit ALPHA processors in 1992, Linux didn't gain 64 bit support until 1996. That's still early, but your statement is not true.
Technically, Windows NT on Alpha (and Solaris I do believe) was merely running in 32bit "mode" (Still used 64bit pointers, however the top word was merely masked off.)
It wasn't until Windows 2000 for Alpha (the version that was literally cut right before shipment... some people managed to get a copy) that full 64bit apps were available!
-Pan
I said no... but I missed and it came out yes.
"How long will it be until competitors such as IBM, HP, Sun Microsystems, Apple Computer and Linux Technology get their code ported to 64-bits?"
The scary thing is that there are likely people who believe this.
I am curious though, I wonder if the 64-bit Windows version can easily switch to 32-bit, a la Solaris?
"It's too bad stupidity isn't painful." - A. S. LaVey
Yes, I believe that's why the summary states "64-bit Windows will handle 16 terabytes of virtual memory, as compared to 4 GB for 32-bit Windows."
Ballmer: we've been working hard to find more bits for some time now
Press: so what exactly was found?
Ballmer: well i'm not entirely sure, you see everyone has been raving about us lacking in the bits in our products
Press: so what did you actually do about it?
Ballmer: we simply acquired the bits we were missing from our product offerings, various high profile acquisitions were conducted to ensure all bits were accounted for
Press: can you tell us preciously who was acquired ?
Ballmer: that would be telling, however I can say that I don't have the slightest idea what all this means, our customers have just been saying "give us more bits!" - we firmly believe we've been innovating for 20 years to continuly improve our products to contain more bits, or features as you will.
Press: Steve, I don't think you understand what you're talking about
Ballmer: we firmly believe we've been innovating for 20 years to continuly improve our products to contain more bits, or features as you will.
Press: you just said that, do you have anything more to add?
Ballmer: we now have more bits than the rest of the software vendor industry!
Press: yeah sure, you do..... {cut!}
Wrong. A hardcore nerd doesn't have enough social skills to convert their relatives.
Linux is not Windows
Don't know what you're problem is but I have Windows 2000, and using NTFS i've got some files that are over 8gb.
Update Watch - Automatic software update notification
It's this kind of childish fanboyism that's keeping many people from trying Linux out.
Linux has it's reasons and uses, so does Windows. The secret is choosing the right tool for your job, according to your skills, patience and time. Linux can be a better tool for some (I use it at home and at work, after I convinced my boss it was ok to let me use it if I didn't lose any productivity), but for everybody. Flaming these people calling them losers is not going to win any of them to your cause, let alone leave them a positive impression about you and the operative system you're promoting. For this reason, your behaviour is more damaging to Linux than the propaganda you normally get from Microsoft.
Hack your mind out of its sandbox.
COME ON.
Please not again this "why is the maximum 1000, NOBODY will ever use more then 10" talk.
Why should it be limited to less than 512TB? Any reason for such a thing? No.
HI O WISE PRINCE. WHT TOOK U SO DAM LONG?
Nowadays I think it's more like, "Three user-land tasks should be enough for poor foreigners."
Stick Men
Will they dear to offend the EU commisioner?
Uhh.. NTFS has always been a 64 bit filesystem. FAT is 32 bit and only supports 2GB files.
Also, many C based apps only use a 32 bit file pointer, so that could be your problem as well.
If you need web hosting, you could do worse than here
I routinely work with files over the 2gb limit...
That's a filesystem limit, not an OS limit. Use NTFS (yuck!), and you won't have that problem...
Not true. The system is based on Fat Binaries. These allow an executable package to contain code for multiple platforms. Theoretically, you could put versions of the same application for NextStep MC68K, OpenStep, OSX 32, OSX 64, Darwin x86 and several others in the same package and have it look like one program. Too big for you? Run lipo to remove versions you don't need. The whole system is based around this concept, allowing the OS to be fully 64bit on 64bit systems and fully 32bit on 32bit systems. Even XCode allows people on 32bit machines to design and compile applications for both platforms and release the compiled application in fat binary format.
We aren't talking quantum leaps in computing, and that's the problem.
Lol, you should go find out what a quantum leap actually is.
The jump from 32 bit to 64 bit Windows is precisely a quantum leap.
Unless you can show me the (infinite number of) versions of Windows that have 32 > bits 64 !
There are places where the networks are not touching,and there are places where they are-Boeing's Lori Gunter
Plus, it will swap everything out to disk even when there's terabyte of free RAM no matter how hard you plead with it not to!
Seriously, when will Redmond stop eutrophycating and start engineering this platform, that once showed so much promise?
You are in a maze of twisty little passages; all alike.
Windows ia a:
32-bit kludge running on top of a
16-bit patch to an
8-bit operating system written for a
4-bit microprocessor by a
2-bit company that can't stand
1-bit of competition
The only real advantage 64-bit has over 32-bit for anyone outside of the supercomputing realm is the memory it can access. ALL applications in Tiger can access 64-bit memory if they are written for it meaning the backend is not written for Cocoa but for Darwin. BTW, Darwin is different than POSIX.
The true genius of Apple is that the data model for Tiger is LP64 which means source for Linux, SGI and Sun is easy to port to the G5 with Tiger.
Not since Marie-Antoinette played milkmaid has looking simple and honest been so fake and complicated.
...their error report server could not handle the Explorer crash reports.
16TB of virtual memory... 512TB page file... aren't they the same thing?
XP x64 isn't fully 64bit. One example is Windows Media Player 10, which is still 32bit
:o :~)
Yes, but remember that Media Player most definitely is not, oh no, no way, not at all, move along nothing to see here, couldn't even possibly be, not even in the realms of possibilties be, no not even if we wanted to make it, part of the operating system.
You'll be saying IE is only 32 bit next
The big reason for going to 64-bit Windows has nothing to do with the word size. The main reason is that AMD64 has shed another chunk of the 8086 instruction set legacy. The IA32 has 8 32-bit general purpose registers, about the same total register storage as the Cosmac 1802... a 4/8 bit microprocessor from the '70s. AMD64 gives you 16 64-bit registers, which is pretty small for a 64-bit machine (Alpha and Power have 32) but big enough to give the compiler room to work in, especially since it's also doubling the number of SSE registers.
Here's some other computers for comparison:
PDP-11, late '60s... 8 16-bit general purpose registers.
VAX, '70s... 16 32-bit GPRs.
68000, ~'80... 8 32-bit GPRs, 8 32-bit index registers.
z8000, ~'80... 16 16-bit registers.
8086, late '70s, 8 16-bit GPRs.
MIPS, '80s, 32 32-bit registers.
SPARC, ~'90... 32 32-bit GPRs, but only 8 were really usable as GPRs for the optimiser. Thus has hurt the Sparc's performance.
Power PC, '90s, 32 32 or 64-bit GPRs
Alpha, '90s, 32 64-bit registers
I would say the 4x register-file space increase is going to be far more important than the larger virtual memory.
Just in case anybody was curious about what the term LP64 implies, or what the alternatives choices where, this page describes them.
The "cue the foo posts in 3, 2, 1..." posts will commence with no subsequent foo posts in 3, 2, 1...
I am not aware of a 64 bit port to SPARC. I know they had 32 bit build for alpha, ppc, MIPS. I have heard from reliable sources that there was a 64 bit port of NT 5 beta (eventually named Win2k) to Alpha. Apparently, a lot of the code from that port was used to make the 64 bit Itanium port.
I have an Athlon 64 system I built, and I'm currently running regular Windows XP Home (which I had a license for from a previous computer, and didn't feel like buying XP Pro). One thing I haven't seen yet is what the costs will be of this x64 version of Windows XP. Will it be a free upgrade? If not, any idea on what it's going to cost? One reason I never tried out the pre-release version of x64 is that it seemed to require an XP Pro key, which I didn't have.
NT is endian-neutral (else it wouldn't be able to run the new PPC970 Xbox2, as the 970 is only big-endian).
I'm not entirely sure *when* that happened, as the old Alpha, etc, versions of NT all ran the chips in little-endian mode, but it is certainly true today.
What's your problem with dual booting? I have a reasonably good computer, and I want to have the maximum performance possible in either operating system.
Plus I have no problems with having a dual boot setup and it's quite functional.
As for VMWare, VMWare is not free unless you warez it, and really VMWare has several limitations. Eg. Multisim 7 runs very slow, 3d applications just don't work, etc (it's a good product otherwise, I love VMWare for what it can do)
I need these applications and I have no choice in my need of them unless I seek another profession. If I had all the software I needed under Linux, I probably wouldn't bother with dual booting. But reality dictates otherwise...
A second PC is something I have used for a long time, but then that second PC got outdated, and I don't want to spend the money on another PC. Keeping one computer upgraded is enough of a financial burden on me, two is just not realistic.
NT on Alpha 10 years ago was NOT a 64 bit os. It was a 32 bit OS running on a 64 bit cpu.
but they blew it. as did everybody else.
Tell that to my dual 667 Alpha7 box that I've had for almost 6 years now running 64bit Linux.
STFU about slashdot bias.
The Alpha was 64-bit, the Alpha version of NT was mostly 32-bit due to the architectural limitations of NT.
Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
Sure for some special applications this might be good, but for the average Joe running his email and an occasional spreadsheet why does it matter? What we have now vastly exceedes 99% of users needs now.
Except of course to help force people back into the upgrade cycle.
"just beacuse" isnt a reason to do something.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Different concept.
The x86 micro architecture specifies 8 32-bit integer registers. (some of which are used for stack pointer, etc)
In x86-64 this was raised to 16 64-bit registers.
If we were talking address space it would be:
2^64 - 2^32 more virtual addresses
Every additional bit that we tack on doubles the address space. Adding 32 bits double's the possible values 32 separate times.
Actually NTFS has supported files upto 16TB in size since 1992.
type Convert c: /FS:ntfs on the command line if u are using a non 9x OS
NT worked fine on the Alpha. Not MS's fault that few people want (and even less need) 64 bit CPU's - hence the lack of third party interest.
I am very small, utmostly microscopic.
It's also not like we had 3.8Ghz 32 bit processors with 4GB of RAM and 400GB drives when the first 32 bit versions of Windows showed up circa 1995. Heck, the Win95 requirements could be satisfied with a 386 and math coprocessor, 8MB of RAM and 30MB of hard drive space. The upper limits of 32 bit computing sounded just about as high back then.
When you release a completely new platform, it had BETTER have some room for technology that doesn't exist right now.
The typical 486 or 1st generation Pentium was running at a clock speed less than 1% of the 64 bit procesors of today, 16MB of RAM similar, etc.
Those numbers put these ceilings pretty easily in range and possibly too conservative.
Sometimes you have to plan for really big numbers. I'm not thrilled with what cars, food, etc. are going to cost (with nothing more than normal inflation) in 35 years when I'm 65, but that doesn't change the fact that I should really plan for about 4 million in assets to completely retire at that age. Saying that $125,000 will be a modest salary equivalent to $45,000 this year matches up pretty well.
The Glass is Too Big: My Take on Things
I also used RedHat on the same machine, and its pointers were 8 bytes long (64 bits).
Activation requires a really annoying call (I have to call to INSTALL an operating system?).
I've made several in my time.
I've done upgrades on hardware for people who HAVE got XP on there (came with the machine), and it's a case of reading a whole bunch of numbers down the phone at them. Anything goes wrong, and you can end up making the same call all over again.
So, to me, the call was neither short, nor painless.
It was irritating and pointless.
I happily pay for any software I use (and although I use Linux heavily, I like having windows as a backup OS for when Linux can't do something).
I have no 'cracked' software.
I just refuse to have that constraint placed on me that I'm at the mercy of Microsoft every time I want to install an OS.