64 bit O/S - Is it worth it?

[JSR]

i see this in bit different light
is like a car... car is discovered for taking you froma place A to place B but this days when buying a car most people would not even think that car has not stero, air con, head rest and other unneded bits
same with windows.

Everyone always uses car analogies..! :biggrin:

In this instance, though, the stereo, the air con, the head rest, etc are what would be additional software installed onto your computer. The car is the hardware, the controls are Windows, anything else is software.

Using your analogy, bloated Windows is like being told that you have to upgrade your unsupported car because all cars must come with a stereo that pumps out 30,000 Watts through several 7ft speakers. In order to continue driving your car, you need to have that stereo, therefore you need a car that has the space for it and the capacity to power it.

The operating system should only be there to enable the software to talk to the hardware - i.e., making the system operate. That's the definition of an operating system. Any other bells and whistles is additional software that you install if and when you need it - it's your choice. Being forced to upgrade your Operating System because the older version is no longer supported, and then being forced to upgrade your hardware because the new OS won't run on the old hardware specs, is the tail wagging the dog. Software required to perform your chosen task should dictate your hardware, not the OS.

Guys. we have fgaster cars, trains. we landed on moon (486 dx2 would do this job) we can travel the world in couple of hours by plain etc... sowhy in this age speed of the procesors, ram and waight of the windows is such a concern??

It's a concern because we shouldn't have to fill up landfill sites with perfectly serviceable computers just because the OS has become too bloated to support it. The operating system should just be the operating system.

[Justin]

Just got my hands on Windows XP 64 Bit, brand new for £55. Just need the rest of the PC to go around it now!

[logobear]

It is often said that bad workmen blame their tools.
This thread is full of compliments, for both XP and win 7
I use them both, they are both good with frustrations.
If you want more power, go to win 7, XP 64 has too many limitations and limited software.
Imho

[Justin]

What are the limitations and software logobear?

[Ian M]

I think a few who have replied to this thread might find this a bit interesting. It's a description of what they used in the Lunar Module when they landed on the moon all those years ago.

AGC

Apollo Guidance Computer


Developed by the MIT Instumentation Laboratory, this was one of the forebears of "mobile computing"! Supercomputers have always been room-filling devices, from their earliest days of code-breaking at Bletchley Park during the war. The requirement for the Lunar Module was obviously for something far smaller and lighter; and one of the ways of achieving this was to create a system built for one purpose only.

Though one of the smallest computers in the world, it still weighed about 70 pounds, was 2 feet long and consumed about 70 watts. It used a combination of technology in the ferrite rope memory and over five thousand integrated circuits, giving 36k of ROM (Read Only Memory) and 2k of RAM (Random Access Memory). With only 2k of space to use for new data during the mission, it's not surprising that the computer could easily become overloaded, as happended during the final stages of Apollo 11's landing approach. It is surprising that they used integrated circuits at all, given the fact that it was such new technology - but reprogramming was essential in flight, and NASA ended up using half the world's supply of intergrated circuits! The memory circuits used magnetic core memory for the erasable part, and high-densiity magnetic rope core memory for the ROM.

Who needs such a powerful home computer now :biggrin:

[Paul]

yeah! its well know fact that one of the appolos had computer that was as powerfull as calculators this days
but there was no graphic interface etc... only digits and letters