how is 64 bit better?

[zoogoo]

I dont understand why everyone is making 64 bit. How is it better? honestly performance wise, i cant tell the difference between my 32 bit daw and 64 Bit, both of which i use.

the jbridger is really buggy, Most of my fav vsts are 32.

[Oberheim 8000]

I don't have much knowledge, but what I know, diference is that, 32 plugins can manage maximum around 4GB ram and 64bit plugins much more. I don't know what is maximum for 64bit. For most synths vsti it doesn't matter, they can be 32 and 64, because they don't need much RAM, they are 32 and 64 for only DAW compatibility. But if some vsti use lot of samples, 64bit sampler can load more as 4GB sample material in to memory.

[whyterabbyt]

I dont understand why everyone is making 64 bit.

Because the processors and OS are 64-bit.

How is it better?

Its 'better' when you need to be able to utilise the full resources and capabilities of your 64-bit OS and CPU.

honestly performance wise, i cant tell the difference between my 32 bit daw and 64 Bit, both of which i use.

Honestly, performance wise its not actually about performance. Though compiler technologies, more available registers and instruction set specialisations mean that 64-bit code is slightly faster.

Try reading some of the other 500 threads which cover the differences between 32-bit and 64-bit plugins.

Most of my fav vsts are 32.

The fact that you prefer to use 32-bit plugins doesnt mean that 64-bit as a 'thing' doesnt have advantages. And vice versa; noone is forcing you to use it just because it has those advantages.

[whyterabbyt]

I don't have much knowledge, but what I know, diference is that, 32 plugins can manage maximum around 4GB ram

Depends. On a 32-bit OS, the whole OS can only access up to around 3Gb of RAM in the first place, shared amongst all its running processes.

On a 64-bit OS, however, a bridged 32-bit plugin might be able to access that much to itself.

I don't know what is maximum for 64bit.

Windows 10 Pro and above can access 2Tb of RAM.

https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-gb/librar ... s.85).aspx

[mcbpete]

I was quickly schooled by Ableton's FAQ (obviously the same information would apply to any DAW or software in general) -

The terms 32-bit and 64-bit refer to how much of your computer's memory (RAM) can be used by applications. The 32-bit version of Live (like all 32-bit applications) can use up to 4GB of RAM, which means that it may not be possible to use very large sample collections or very memory-hungry plug-ins.

In contrast, the 64-bit version of Live can use a theoretical maximum of 16 exabytes of RAM - much more RAM than computers actually have. This means you can work with Live Sets (natively, with third-party plug-ins, and in ReWire configurations) that are much larger and more memory-intensive than in the 32-bit version.

There are no differences in CPU handling between the 32-bit and the 64-bit version however due to persistent Out of Memory crashes when using the 32-bit version, we recommend the 64-bit version for improved stability.

[PurpleSunray]

Most of my fav vsts are 32.

the jbridger is really buggy

I have the same problem...
I actually face the problems as described on Ableton FAQ (out of memory crashes) and would like to change to 64bit... besides the fact that Live 10 is 64bit only. But can't. Those olds plugin are not available on 64bit and with jbridger I see black plugin UIs, random crashes during working and for some plugins even the conversion step fails.

Someone here with time and motivation to start a open-source / community-driven project to build an alternative to jbridger .. that actually works?

[risome]

memory

[Distorted Horizon]

How is it better.

In every way

[fmr]

I was quickly schooled by Ableton's FAQ (obviously the same information would apply to any DAW or software in general) -

The terms 32-bit and 64-bit refer to how much of your computer's memory (RAM) can be used by applications. The 32-bit version of Live (like all 32-bit applications) can use up to 4GB of RAM, which means that it may not be possible to use very large sample collections or very memory-hungry plug-ins.

Actually, this is only true if the 32-bit version of Live is running in a 64-bit OS (which most likely it will currently). If it was running in a 32-bit OS, this would be even much more squeezed in terms of RAM, because the theoretical max 4GB of RAM (which, in Windows XP 32-bit would be reduced to circa 3.4 GB) would have to accomodate the OS, the DAW, the plug-ins, and any other process running in background.

[mystran]

Depends. On a 32-bit OS, the whole OS can only access up to around 3Gb of RAM in the first place, shared amongst all its running processes.

Actually... CPUs as old as Pentium Pro come with PAE extension that allows you to map 36-bits worth of physical memory, allowing access to 64GB of physical memory. This is WAY before anyone was even thinking about making a 64-bit version of x86. At least in server versions Windows have supported PAE at least back to 2000 although they had artificial limitations on the maximum memory they'd let you use depending on how much you'd pay for your license.

The only real limitation is that you can't have more than 4GB mapped in a single address space and if you want to keep the kernel (or some parts of it at least; again this is not technically necessary, although it does improve performance of system calls) mapped into every process as well, then that's how you end up with figures like 3GB or 3.5GB or whatever.

[whyterabbyt]

Depends. On a 32-bit OS, the whole OS can only access up to around 3Gb of RAM in the first place, shared amongst all its running processes.

Actually... CPUs as old as Pentium Pro come with PAE extension that allows you to map 36-bits worth of physical memory, allowing access to 64GB of physical memory. This is WAY before anyone was even thinking about making a 64-bit version of x86. At least in server versions Windows have supported PAE at least back to 2000 although they had artificial limitations on the maximum memory they'd let you use depending on how much you'd pay for your license.

Yeah, I was talking about the consumer OS versions, ie what you'd expect people to actually use for their DAWs.

KVR mangled the link I gave, but its MS's authoritive doc on memory availability, including Windows Server capabilities too, version by version.

[Miles1981]

There is also one other point... 32bits instruction sets are more than 10 years old. They don't have any SIMD (more or less).
Also Apple is dropping support next year and Windows may soon follow.

[mystran]

32bits instruction sets are more than 10 years old. They don't have any SIMD (more or less).

What exactly are you smoking?

All the SIMD extensions work perfectly fine in 32-bit mode and SSE2 even predates x86-64.

[stratum]

Windows is not likely to drop any 32 bit support, otherwise COBOL compilers from 1990's wouldn't work. Big problem

[mcbpete]

Windows is not likely to drop any 32 bit support, otherwise COBOL compilers from 1990's wouldn't work. Big problem

Think that era was an even smaller number of bits (16-bit era), which I think was dropped circa Win 7