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Old 04-23-2008, 01:52 PM
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naquaada naquaada is offline
 
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It is / would it be possible to run 64bit programs on OSx86? This includes the question: Do we need it? Which programs make use of the 64bit bus width?
2 Opteron systems: OSx86 10.5.8, Andy's 9.8.0 kernel, Asus A8N-SLI Premium, Opteron 185 o'clocked @ 2 x 2,95 GHz (2nd system 2.6 GHz), ATI Radeon HD2600XT 256MB Dual-Monitor 2x HP L2035, 4 GB RAM, Griffin FireWave as main audio device, Marvell + nForce LAN, Asus U3S6 USB3/SATA6 card, 5,5 TB harddisk, Firewire 800 card, Apple Remote + eHome IR receiver, 2x Wacom serial graphics tablet, Canon Pixma iP4700, Logitech Internet Navigator wireless keyboard/mouse combination.

My Audio stuff: M-Audio Transit USB (default audio), M-Audio ProFire 610, M-Audio ProFire Lightbridge (34 channels) using Creamware A16 ADAT converter • MIDI: M-Audio Midiman 4x MIDI interface • Behringer Audio Mixers: Xenyx 1002, Xenyx 1002FX, Xenyx 1202FX, Eurorack UB1002FX, Eurorack MX1804FX, Eurorack MX262A • FX devices: Lexicon MPX100 DSP, Behringer DSP-1000 Virtualizer, Behringer MiniFEX 800 DSP, Behringer Multicom Pro MDX4400 compressor • RETRO: MSSIAH midi/sequencer/synthesizer cardridge for the C64 (Dual-SID), Steinberg M.S.I. MIDI Interface for C64
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Old 04-23-2008, 05:41 PM
WinLinMac01 WinLinMac01 is offline
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Not at the moment. You would have to wait for a newer release from the OSx"86" community that will support 64-bit apps in the near future.
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Old 04-23-2008, 06:39 PM
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R0GUE R0GUE is offline
 
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Quote:
Originally Posted by naquaada
It is / would it be possible to run 64bit programs on OSx86? This includes the question: Do we need it? Which programs make use of the 64bit bus width?
To be perfectly honest I think the majority of us have no real need for 64-bit ... well, not just yet.

Do you remember last years WWDC keynote? Steve Jobs had a 32 and 64-bit version of a demo app that he was showing off. Both were simultaneously loading in a 4GB photo of the Congress library. The 32-bit version had to swap out to disk and was getting bogged down; the 64-bit version didn't even blink. It did a filter in 28 seconds that took 84 seconds with the 32-bit version. This is a really good example of how 64-bit can help us, but to be honest, how many of us are going to be throwing around 4GB image files in the foreseeable future? For now, casual users aren't really hitting the limits of 32-bit, but in a couple of years I'm sure the landscape will change and we'll be doing just that, but for now 64-bit is really a requirement for the Pro-App/Scientific industry.

This is not to say that I don't want or need 64-bit right now -- I do :-)
MacBook Pro 15" | Mac OS X 10.6 • 2 GHz Intel Core Duo • 2 GB DDR2-667 • ATI Radeon Mobility X1600 128 MB • 100 GB Serial-ATA
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Last edited by R0GUE; 09-08-2008 at 08:17 AM. Reason: cleaned up quotation
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Old 04-23-2008, 08:37 PM
YamatoHD YamatoHD is offline
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i would need it too....
i work with maya alot, all the easy stuff i do in osx, but when it comes to heavy projects, i must use vista x64.....
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  #5  
Old 04-23-2008, 09:29 PM
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naquaada naquaada is offline
 
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Quote:
Originally Posted by R0GUE
The 32-bit version had to swap out to disk and was getting bogged down; the 64-bit version didn't even blink.
But this only works if there's enough RAM. If you have 'only' 2 GB the 64bit version has to swap too.
2 Opteron systems: OSx86 10.5.8, Andy's 9.8.0 kernel, Asus A8N-SLI Premium, Opteron 185 o'clocked @ 2 x 2,95 GHz (2nd system 2.6 GHz), ATI Radeon HD2600XT 256MB Dual-Monitor 2x HP L2035, 4 GB RAM, Griffin FireWave as main audio device, Marvell + nForce LAN, Asus U3S6 USB3/SATA6 card, 5,5 TB harddisk, Firewire 800 card, Apple Remote + eHome IR receiver, 2x Wacom serial graphics tablet, Canon Pixma iP4700, Logitech Internet Navigator wireless keyboard/mouse combination.

My Audio stuff: M-Audio Transit USB (default audio), M-Audio ProFire 610, M-Audio ProFire Lightbridge (34 channels) using Creamware A16 ADAT converter • MIDI: M-Audio Midiman 4x MIDI interface • Behringer Audio Mixers: Xenyx 1002, Xenyx 1002FX, Xenyx 1202FX, Eurorack UB1002FX, Eurorack MX1804FX, Eurorack MX262A • FX devices: Lexicon MPX100 DSP, Behringer DSP-1000 Virtualizer, Behringer MiniFEX 800 DSP, Behringer Multicom Pro MDX4400 compressor • RETRO: MSSIAH midi/sequencer/synthesizer cardridge for the C64 (Dual-SID), Steinberg M.S.I. MIDI Interface for C64
Last edited by R0GUE; 09-08-2008 at 08:16 AM. Reason: Cleaned up quotation
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  #6  
Old 04-23-2008, 09:40 PM
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R0GUE R0GUE is offline
 
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Quote:
Originally Posted by naquaada
But this only works if there's enough RAM. If you have 'only' 2 GB the 64bit version has to swap too.
That's correct. In order to really utilise 64-bit you're going to need a ton of ram. However, with more and more of today's towers accommodating 16Gb ram, 4Gb ram would be the minimum and 8Gb would be the sweet spot.

Edit: I forgot to add that the latest Mac Pros can accommodate 32Gb ram!!!
Last edited by R0GUE; 09-08-2008 at 08:16 AM. Reason: Cleaned up quotation
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  #7  
Old 10-16-2008, 05:45 PM
xevean xevean is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by naquaada View Post
It is / would it be possible to run 64bit programs on OSx86? This includes the question: Do we need it? Which programs make use of the 64bit bus width?
Side Effects's Houddini is exclusive to 64 bit so yeah....
http://www.sidefx.com/index.php?opti...021&Itemid=270
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  #8  
Old 10-17-2008, 12:26 AM
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mercurysquad mercurysquad is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by naquaada View Post
But this only works if there's enough RAM. If you have 'only' 2 GB the 64bit version has to swap too.
Not true. 64bit capability is useful for a lot of things other than accessing >4GB memory. Like being able to do arithmetic on 64bit integers directly instead of splitting them up into cumbersome 32-bit operations. Or load/store 64bit qwords atomically (useful for a lot of things, obvious example is OS X kernel's own timing routines which have to do some quite messy and slow math, with lock-free access but still needing to loop back if one of the 32bit dword changed while we were doing our messy 64bit calculation.. and so on). And 64bit architecture gives you tons of new 64bit registers. An optimizing compiler will be able to make better use of those extra registers (unlike x86 where you only have like 5-6 registers to play with), resulting in faster compiled code.

All that said, most current programs are not 64bit, and if they are, they typically do not take full advantage of all these new features. Things will change (soon) but for now, 64bit is still not a big deal (specially for running leopard, kernel is still 32bit binary with only bits of 64bit routines, even though it allows you to run 64bit userspace apps). So you're not losing much now.


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Last edited by mercurysquad; 10-17-2008 at 12:32 AM.
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