Which Windows 7 Is Right for You — 32-Bit or 64-Bit?
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Let's see for the typical desktop you won't be seeing any strictly 64bit cpus for the time being. The present cpus available simply support the 64bit OSs as well as the 32bit.
That's what I was alluding to in responding to Jimbo's post.
The only processor supported by Win7 that's capable of operating in something you'd call a "64-bit mode" is the x64, a.k.a. x86-64, a.k.a. AMD64, a.k.a. EM64T.
It is just as happy executing 32-bit code and it does so "natively" (in hardware) without any form of emulation being required or employed. There is no "instruction fiddling" taking place - the processor just sits in a 32-bit mode.
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What's a "native 64-bit CPU"?
"It's a technical explanation beyond the scope of this post" ...
Spoilsport
OK, I'll give 'ya a few...
Good ol' IBM: Deep Blue and ASCI White. Today's RoadRunner and coming soon: Sequoia.
IBM RS64 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
... and has been
64-bit from the start...
A lot of famous computers are RS/6000 based, such as the
P2SC based
Deep Blue supercomputer that beat world champion
Garry Kasparov at chess in 1997 and the
POWER3 based
ASCI White which was the fastest computer in the world 2000-2002.
Where did Microsoft go to get a CPU for the X-Box? 
Windows NT and Windows 2000 'supported' the DEC 64-bit Alpha chip...
Quite the Intel 'announcement'... Then:
The Alpha architecture was sold, along with most parts of DEC, to
Compaq in 1998. Compaq, already an
Intel customer, decided to phase out Alpha in favor of the forthcoming
Hewlett-Packard/Intel
Itanium architecture, and sold all Alpha
intellectual property to Intel in 2001, effectively killing the product.
Last edited by chuckr; 02 Nov 2009 at 08:03.
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It's hard to see what all those kids beavering away in Mom's basement are going to need 128 bits for. And frightening...
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