mknabster Posted March 3, 2009 Share Posted March 3, 2009 Hey guys, i currently have XP Pro Sp2 32bit installed on Bootcamp, but i would love to be able to utilize my 4 GBs of RAM with XP 64bit. I tried Vista 64bit, but it wasn't compatible with half of my programs. So i was wondering, can i upgrade my existing 32bit version of XP to 64bit, and would the drivers still work? Like i know Apple doesn't have a set of drivers for XP 64bit, but would the 32bit ones work if i upgraded? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
scottishduck Posted March 5, 2009 Share Posted March 5, 2009 Hey guys, i currently have XP Pro Sp2 32bit installed on Bootcamp, but i would love to be able to utilize my 4 GBs of RAM with XP 64bit. I tried Vista 64bit, but it wasn't compatible with half of my programs. So i was wondering, can i upgrade my existing 32bit version of XP to 64bit, and would the drivers still work? Like i know Apple doesn't have a set of drivers for XP 64bit, but would the 32bit ones work if i upgraded? Windows 7 x64, XP 64 is a horrible OS that technically isn't even 64 bit. There are virtually no drivers for it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mknabster Posted March 5, 2009 Author Share Posted March 5, 2009 Windows 7 x64, XP 64 is a horrible OS that technically isn't even 64 bit. There are virtually no drivers for it. Yea, so i have been told. How's Vista 64bit? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
scottishduck Posted March 5, 2009 Share Posted March 5, 2009 Yea, so i have been told. How's Vista 64bit? Assuming its on your Macbook, it should be really snappy. Plus you have the advantage of 100% bootcamp compatability. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mknabster Posted March 5, 2009 Author Share Posted March 5, 2009 Assuming its on your Macbook, it should be really snappy. Plus you have the advantage of 100% bootcamp compatability. Yea, the few things that i noticed, was that half of my programs i have, didn't work on it, they needed 32bit. Like Solidworks 2009 for example, and Zonealarm security suite. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
S.SubZero Posted March 5, 2009 Share Posted March 5, 2009 Hey guys, i currently have XP Pro Sp2 32bit installed on Bootcamp, but i would love to be able to utilize my 4 GBs of RAM with XP 64bit. I tried Vista 64bit, but it wasn't compatible with half of my programs. So i was wondering, can i upgrade my existing 32bit version of XP to 64bit, and would the drivers still work? Like i know Apple doesn't have a set of drivers for XP 64bit, but would the 32bit ones work if i upgraded? 1). If half, as in 50% of all of your programs, do not work with Vista x64, you are using very strange software that is highly vertical and isn't going to work right under anything except the OS you are currently using them on. Period. Of all of the software I have ever used in Vista x64, the number of programs I have that refused to work are.. uh.. hmm.. none. You mention Solidworks 2009.. Their site says Vista x64 is fully supported (as well as XP64). There is also full 64-bit support in Zonealarm. 2). XP64 is not "horrible." It's actually very nice. XP64 does require 64-bit Windows drivers which are for XP64 or Server 2003 64-bit (which XP64 is based on). It cannot use 32-bit drivers at all. The driver support is not as strong as XP32 nor Vista. This is not saying the support is bad, or the support isn't there at all. It does require more poking around for some drivers, and there are instances where a particular driver simply will not exist, but this will be for less common and very home-user specific things. Web cams on generic laptops, for example. I ran XP64 for just over a year on my gaming rig. It was a fairly simple rig, meant strictly for gaming, and in that capacity it ran extremely well. Every game I threw on it worked. Drivers for my video card, sound card, and other things were current and updated regularly right alongside the 32-bit XP versions. That being said, I don't recommend XP64 anymore. It has fallen off MS's radar for the most part, and pretty much any 64-bit system that could run XP64 can run Vista x64, so XP64 has lost it's appeal. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mknabster Posted March 5, 2009 Author Share Posted March 5, 2009 Yea i did go on Solidworks site, and it does say that it does support it. Which is why i don't understand why it wouldn't install. It gave me an error saying that my version doesn't support this OS. So i don't know. I was looking for 64bit Zonealarm, but from what i got from their site, it's in beta right now. Which one did you find? I also just remembered the other software that didn't work, MacDrive. If i can't install that, then i really can't have Windows at all. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
S.SubZero Posted March 5, 2009 Share Posted March 5, 2009 I also just remembered the other software that didn't work, MacDrive. If i can't install that, then i really can't have Windows at all. I CERTAINLY RESEARCHED THIS CLEARLY AND DEEPLY BEFORE MAKING MY CLAIM As for ZoneAlarm, whether it's beta or not just try it. ZoneAlarm is kind of out of favor these days anyway. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mknabster Posted March 5, 2009 Author Share Posted March 5, 2009 I CERTAINLY RESEARCHED THIS CLEARLY AND DEEPLY BEFORE MAKING MY CLAIM As for ZoneAlarm, whether it's beta or not just try it. ZoneAlarm is kind of out of favor these days anyway. Huh, that was the version i tried, 7.2.0, and it gave me an error saying it couldn't't be installed. That's odd, o well. I didn't really like how my games reacted with Vista anyways, i'll just stay with XP for now. Thanks for lending your advice S.SubZero! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DukeRaoul Posted March 19, 2009 Share Posted March 19, 2009 Huh, that was the version i tried, 7.2.0, and it gave me an error saying it couldn't't be installed. That's odd, o well. I didn't really like how my games reacted with Vista anyways, i'll just stay with XP for now. Thanks for lending your advice S.SubZero! You will definitely get higher FPS in any high-end games on XP than on Vista. Simply put Vista uses too many system resources to power the OS, leaving less power to run your games. I just run XP 32-bit for games like Crysis and GTA IV, and I have only 3.25 GB of RAM available of my 4 GB, but there's always plenty of RAM to go around anyway. From my experience, most games use 2 GB or less. But if you're doing CAD work with Solidworks and whatnot, I guess you might need more RAM... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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