On Monday 08 December 2008 17:09:04 Albert Hopkins wrote:
> On Mon, 2008-12-08 at 14:59 +0100, pat wrote:
> > Hello,
> >
> > I've bought a new laptop with Core 2 Duo processor which is 64 bit. My
> > question is if applications (see below) compiled and running over 64 bits
> > are stable enough or if I should compile for 32 bits.
> >
> > The applications are:
> > - Seamoneky/Firefox
> > - Java
> > - Flash
> > - Audacious
> > - mplayer
> > - VirtualBox/VMware
> > - Qemu
> > - Kerberos/OpenLDAP/OpenSSH (for these I think they are stable)
> > - X.org/fluxbox
> > - system suspending
>
> With very very few exceptions, stability shouldn't be much of an issue
> for you. It's pretty much the same source code base. What you should be
> more concerned about is application availability, especially WRT:
>
> * if the application is closed-source is there a 64-bit version
> * have the Gentoo maintainers marked it (yet) for amd64 (stable).
> Gentoo is (or at least used to be) a bit slower at marking
> things amd64 just because there are (were) fewer testers. I
> think this is pretty much a non-issue nowadays.
> * if it has code optimized in assembler is there optimized
> x64/compabile assembler.
>
> We (well, I) still use the closed-source (well, binary) versions of
> java. IBM's Java at least has a 64-bit port.
>
> Adobe just released a Linux x64 port of Flash (in Alpha). From my
> experience it's just as stable (or rather unstable) as the x86 version.
>
> win32codecs will not work unless it's used by a 32-bit exe (You can run
> 32-bit apps on x64).
>
> System suspending if largely kernel.
>
> Anyway probably more than you wanted to know, but I don't think
> stability is ever really a factor. Linux has supported 64-bit
> processors for at least 15 years (I think). Usually the only issue
> (just like running Linux on *any* non-x86 architecture) is the
> availability of proprietary apps.
>
> -a
I am using amd64/x86 Gentoo for 3 years. Both of them are really really great.
Especially amd64 machine which is my desktop/development can run simply
everything. All the mainline applications can run perfect on in
So if you want my advise, forget about the x86 and go install amd64. You wont
regret it :)
--
Markos Chandras
