D/L WinXP Pro x64 Free and Legal

Faram · Post by **Faram** » 2005-01-04 02:54am

Microsoft is releasing it as a free BETA!

If you have a 64bit system it might be worth checking out

Glocksman · Post by **Glocksman** » 2005-01-04 03:21am

SWEET.
This'll go well with my new A64/nForce3 setup.
I even have a spare hard drive so I don't have to nuke my existing install.

Thanks, Faram.
You're a sweet Swede indeed.

Seggybop · Post by **Seggybop** » 2005-01-04 03:24am

Yeah... they've had that for many months now.

You can also download Windows 2003 x86 normal and x86-64 versions free from there as well.

Sharp-kun · Post by **Sharp-kun** » 2005-01-04 09:10am

"Will expire in 360 days"

Hmm. Will this be something that will come back to bite me in the ass?

Terr Fangbite · Post by **Terr Fangbite** » 2005-01-04 12:00pm

bout time winblows catches up with linux.

phongn · Post by **phongn** » 2005-01-04 12:31pm

Microsoft has had AMD64 builds internally for awhile, just not released to the public. They've also had IA64 stuff out for awhile.

Ace Pace · Post by **Ace Pace** » 2005-01-04 12:55pm

Sharp-kun wrote:"Will expire in 360 days"

Hmm. Will this be something that will come back to bite me in the ass?

Nope, since the XP 64-bit is due to be released this year, for a free download to XP users.
The 360 days was when the release date wasn't known I belive.

Unless stuff changed alot, I won't be upgrading, I like my CD-burning and other such features.

Uraniun235 · Post by **Uraniun235** » 2005-01-04 01:42pm

Generally free evaluation versions of Windows will only function for a given period of time. The Windows 2000 evaluation would only last 180 days - heh, I remember the computer lab at the high school having to reinstall Win2k on all the computers.

Back then I'm pretty sure it was based on a registry key, so when the expiration was approaching, you could roll the registry key back some more.

Vertigo1 · Post by **Vertigo1** » 2005-01-04 02:38pm

Sharp-kun wrote:"Will expire in 360 days"

Hmm. Will this be something that will come back to bite me in the ass?

Not if you plan on making the upgrade permanent. XP Pro users can get the 64-bit edition (full) for free.

Ace Pace · Post by **Ace Pace** » 2005-01-04 02:39pm

Vertigo1 wrote:
Sharp-kun wrote:"Will expire in 360 days"

Hmm. Will this be something that will come back to bite me in the ass?
Not if you plan on making the upgrade permanent. XP Pro users can get the 64-bit edition (full) for free.

The bigger question, is there any kind of boost from using the 64-bit edition?

Glocksman · Post by **Glocksman** » 2005-01-04 02:47pm

I wish I could answer that question, but the install routine kept crapping out on me when it reached the 'installing components' screen. The video would just blank out and it wouldn't install any further, even after multiple reboots and 15 minute wait times.

MS still has some work to do on hardware compatibility.
I'll try it again when I upgrade my video card later in the year.

Vertigo1 · Post by **Vertigo1** » 2005-01-04 03:23pm

Ace Pace wrote:The bigger question, is there any kind of boost from using the 64-bit edition?

Currently, not much if any. However, once 64-bit applications for window start becoming commonplace, I suppose we'll see.

phongn · Post by **phongn** » 2005-01-04 03:37pm

There might be a benefit from the increased number of registers available to the AMD64 design. OTOH, that could be offset from the increased pointer size (halving the effective cache size when comparing to IA32 implementations).

Xon · Post by **Xon** » 2005-01-04 04:18pm

Ace Pace wrote:The bigger question, is there any kind of boost from using the 64-bit edition?

The kernel has a lot more virtual address space to play with.

And native 64bit apps do not have the 2/3gb virtual space limitation. Its very posible to run into 2/3gb virtual address space limitation these days.

Take World of Warcraft for example. You can only map a fraction of the content into virtual memory and let the OS pull stuff in as required, as there just isnt enough address space.