With Windows Vista on the horizon will companies finally adopt the 64bit architecture that they pretty much refused to adopt with Windows XP64, or will we the consumer be left waiting longer for those 64 bit drivers and applications that should have been here a couple years ago?
Last year when I upgraded my system, I decided to go with Windows XP64, I figured since I had a 64bit processor, why not use a (supposed) 64bit operating system. I've seen no difference between XP32 and XP64 except for the major lack of support, it seems that the majority of companies decided to ignore XP64 altogether, why I don't quite know.
Little did I know that XP64 was actually DOA, it might have been a nice idea, but I think companies just felt it was to much work to create to sets of drivers for their products, or write to different software programs for essentially the same OS. Why would companies want to do extra work when XP32 is embedded in our culture right now, and XP64 wasn't adopted by anyone but the enthusiasts or those who were curious? Those who were curious went right back to XP32 after finding all the problems that came with it, why should people try and work with an OS that really isn't supported by most manufacturers. Yes the larger companies like NVIDIA and ATI release drivers for XP64, but not often, then you have the other large companies that don't release any 64bit drivers and you are stuck with hardware that doesn't work with your freshly installed OS.
An example would be HP, I have owned and own a few HP printers, they are a huge company that appears not to care about those who use XP64, I've had my new printer almost a year and there are still no 64bit drivers for it, only a 'workaround' is listed on the site for XP64, and a 'coming soon' message regarding XP64 drivers. Almost a year, and they are still 'coming soon', I don't believe they are coming at all...
Application software and games are another story, there is a huge list out there of software that is incompatible with XP64, but I thought there was an XP32 emulator built into XP64, guess it needs an upgrade as well...
What I can't understand is why would companies not want to move to a 64bit platform, or at least not shut out those consumers that did move to XP64? Isn't 64bit computing supposed to be better and more advanced? Supposedly the advantages are great when you move to 64bit computing, the sheer processing power is far greater than 32bit. Will we ever truly see 64bit computing accepted as the norm like the 32bit processor was/is? I believe we will, but just not for quite a while. For on thing there are to many computers out there running with 32bit processors in them, why would companies want to try and support both platforms...
Apparently though, even Microsoft is not going to fully embrace 64bit computing, as they are releasing a Vista64 and a Vista32. What does this say to companies that make the hardware and software? I believe it says that 32bit computing will not be going away anytime soon and just keep on doing what you are doing and you should be fine. So when Vista comes out finally, you will have a choice to make, the obvious choice would be to stick with 32bit, if the lack of support for XP64 is any indication of what to expect for future 64bit computing, we are going to be stuck with running 32bit applications on our spanking new 64bit processors.
Yeah you can argue that there are advantages to using a 64bit CPU with a 32bit operating system, yes I know firsthand that it is much faster, and things seem to move more smoothly, but wouldn't things even be better if the drivers and software where specifically designed to work on that 64bit CPU?
64bit computing is the future right? You may have read my past article about my experience with XP64, or lack thereof, and nothing has changed since I wrote that article. Being a reviewer I receive lots of new products to test/review etc, I've found that even the newest products are not 64bit compatible, and if they are they are only partially compatible. At this point in time I am about to uninstall XP64 and go back to XP32. I actually just got the new release of Gentoo for 64bit and am going to be installing that as soon as the hard drives I ordered get here.
We are stuck with Windows, it is everywhere and it will not be going away anytime soon, it has become a household word, most people out there are oblivious to alternative operating systems because it seems that Windows has invaded our culture, actually the culture of the entire world. You pretty much can't go anywhere in the world and not find Windows on a computer there.
What's the point of all of this? None really, more of a rant, more of wondering when the future will get here.
I welcome you the reader to please jump in the forums and comment on this as I would love to here your thoughts as well about the future of 64bit computing.
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