Moving FM9 to New Computer - Deciding on OS

[Syed Zaeem Hosain (Syed.Hosain@aeris.net)]

> However, the driver issue in XP 64 bit seems a bigger stumbling block to me.

Yes ... agreed! Many hardware mftr's never implemented 64-bit drivers for XP Pro 64, because that OS was not a big seller ... at the time, most of the Intel and AMD processors on the market were 32-bit anyway.

And now that 64-bit processors, Vista 64-bit (less so) and Win 7 64-bit (more so) platforms are much more common, they are doing 64-bit drivers, but are still _highly_ unlikely to develop and release 64-bit drivers for XP Pro 64 for any of the their new or old hardware.

> And I've never been fond of the idea of upgrading to brand new hardware and using XP Pro 32 bit - sort of like driving a formula one car with a speed limiter of 50 miles an hour. 

:)

In particular, if your new computer has more than 3 to 3.5GB of main memory (theoretically 4GB, but the video and other hardware drivers use some of that space), then anything above that limit would be wasted - 32-bit OS's will never see or use that extra RAM.

Z