Replies to post #10755 on Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD)

[jhalada]

Elmer,

But 32bit CPUs have 36 address bits so 64GB is the current end of the road, for now.

Theoretically, this can be extended further, but 2 years from now, a 32 bit CPU will be an ugly duckling.

Intel will need to have either an AMD64 clone, or mainstream Itanium that outperforms AMD64 CPUs in both x86-32 or IA64 modes. Otherwise, all the premium CPU dollars will go to AMD.

Joe

[Haddock]

But 32bit CPUs have 36 address bits so 64GB is the current end of the road, for now.

My guess is that Prescott has PAE-40 like Opteron, so the limit (such as it is) is raised to 1Tbyte.

[yourbankruptcy]

Elmer, I still recall myself programming 16 bit segment registers. I was not pretty. So your claim that 32 bit cpu supports 36 address lines is theoretically correct, but practically wrong.

Moreover, there is a big performance penalty. Big.

So let just to keep discussion realistic assume that 32 Windows supports 2 Gig for apps and 32 bit Linux approximately 3 Gig.