windows XP 64-bit

[Sethman]

ok so i just bought a 64 bit HP laptop with 4 gigs of RAM and a 320g HD. and of course it came with vista. and just like everyone else. i don't want vista. what hoops will i have to jump through to get my 64-bit computer running with an adequate version of XP?

any advise would greatly be appreciated

thanks, seth

 

[Celegorm]

even vista haters will agree that XP 64 bit is a lot worse than vista ever was. Stick with vista, it will surprise you.

 

[Sethman]

what will i sacrifice if i were to load XP 32 bit onto my 64 bit processor? i hear AMD processors allow this. i am still in the learning process so please excuse any "stupid" questions i might have.
thanks, seth

 

[Ronspc]

No such thing as a stupid question. A stupid question you dont ask is stupid...I will get some information for ya on what you will sacrifice.

 

[Celegorm]

the only thing you are really sacraficing is a few megs of RAM. How much you'll sacrafice depends on video cards some other memory-containing devices. This is not dependant on teh processor, it's the 32-bit limitation.

 

[Daeva]

Were you experiencing a problem with vista that made you want to downgrade? With 4 gigs you will be able to run vista full graphics with no problem. 90% of program and driver compatibility issues were fixed with SP1. I agree, xp 64 bit is worse than vista. On top of that, vista has a very nice solution to 32 bit emulation for programs that are not compatible with an x64 architecture. I seem to remember XP being quite a catastrophe when it was released, SP1 made it much more stable, but too many people clung to windows 98 and 2000 (or *cough* Millennium Edition). Retrospect is always 20/20.
While xp 32 might be more "stable", you are missing out on several key features that Vista offers. The two biggest of these are:
Varying support for near 4G of ram and absolutely no support for > 4G (as was stated previously).
The other big thing people forget about is DirectX 10. If you're going to be gaming at all, you're missing out on quite a bit by sticking with XP, since it only supports up to DX9.

 

[Sethman]

no i don't have a direct problem with vista-(yet anyways)... i'm just used to XP and have grown pretty fond of it. but at the same time i have not given myself enough time to see what vista completely has to offer. so i will listen to celegorm and ride it out for a little while... what is windows 7 supposed to be promising?

thanks for all the input so far guys
-seth

 

[Shadowmoose]

Why all the hating on XP 64? I ran it for years with absolutely no trouble. If you took a random person and installed XP 64 instead of 32 on their system I doubt they would care or notice a difference.

As for the guy asking about reverting to XP I don't see the point at the moment unless you already own an extra copy. With the specs on your laptop I'd say just stick with Vista, it has more to offer then XP in future terms.

However you mentioned you have an HP so I'm just going to guess that you will want to format and reinstall vista as HP has a habit of slapping all this extra crap on your system you don't need that makes it a lot slower.

If you plan on upping to Win7 then just stay with Vista right now, the two are very closely related but with key differences. Don't tell anyone but I'm trying out the leaked build 7000 of 7 and I must say I like it a lot compared to XP and Vista.