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64-bit Firefox is the New Default on 64-bit Windows (mozilla.org)

Posted by msmash on from the moving-forward dept.

An anonymous reader shares a blog post: Users on 64-bit Windows who download Firefox will now get our 64-bit version by default. That means they'll install a more secure version of Firefox, one that also crashes a whole lot less. How much less? In our tests so far, 64-bit Firefox reduced crashes by 39% on machines with 4GB of RAM or more.

4 of 178 comments (clear)

  1. Re:How about upgrades/updates? by Shimbo · · Score: 3, Informative

    All my windows machines have 64-bit Windows installed, but I have already installed the 32-bit version of Firefox on them (because that was the default at the time). How about automatically UPGRADING my 32-bit Firefox to 64-bit on machines that can handle it?

    This is scheduled for the next release, Firefox 56.

  2. Re:About time! by Darinbob · · Score: 4, Informative

    Also when people had 4GB RAM max on their computers there was no advantage of a 64bit OS. The 64-bit applications are larger and they are not faster. If the 32-bit version of Firefox crashes more then it's because they aren't spending as much time maintaining it.

  3. Re:Firefox 64-bit Works Every Time by TeknoHog · · Score: 2, Informative

    x86-64 is about much more than the address space.

    Please enlighten us. Ignorant mortals might think they're compiling the exact same code.

    More and larger registers. SSE1/2 instructions guaranteed, these are optional in x86. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

    There's even a Linux project called x32 to make use of these features, while limiting the address space to 32 bits per process for potential speedups. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

    --
    Escher was the first MC and Giger invented the HR department.
  4. Re:About time! by F.Ultra · · Score: 4, Informative

    64-bit applications can be faster if the code benefits from the twice available registers.