Simviation Forums

Hi Guys
can anyone tell me if it is worth upgrading my windows XPpro 32bit to windows pro 64bit as my system can take 64bit would this be better for fs9 or would it make no difference to my system
cheers Flyingbartdude.

I have read of people who have done it and said that FS9 works somewhat better. Had less stutters and faster texture refreshing time. Main problem of Win Xp 64 though is the difficulty in finding drivers for some peripherals and incompatibilities with some older programs.

Curious... since FS9 is a 32 bit application...
Anyway, *purchasing* the 64 bit version of Windows XP after having *purchased* the 32 bit, just to see if a 32 bit application will run smoother, sounds a bit like an overkill.  ;)

I kinda doubt it would make any difference at all. The only thing might be just the fact that a fresh OS install smoothed out something. It would probably be best to just get Vista rather than XP64.

Texture laods are typcially faster in x64.. I fly both x32 and x64.

The OS tends to provide better bandwidth on the CPU/Memory system HOWEVER there can be downfalls to the x64 system, one of which is: does all your software run on x64 and do the devices you run have excellent x64 support?

I do not know if Microsoft still offers the 6 month trial of x64 but if they do, I would try it that way before completely moving to a x64 purchase.

Disk access tends to be better in x64 and there is software such as Adobe Photoshop (pro) which is x64 compliant. Some games have x64 patches and run better in that environment. Your hardware must be up to the job too.


To tell you the truth, with VISTA coming, buying x64 makes little sense especially if you have not had experience with it. There are some software titiles which require special attention to be run in x64 such as 3DMark02, 03, 05. That program will log errors in the Windows log file until you properly install the x64 driver manually which they do not provide correctly.

I would stay with x32 unless you get the trial version of x64 and work with it first so you understand the differences and how to deal with the minor issues that may pop up.

I kinda doubt it would make any difference at all. The only thing might be just the fact that a fresh OS install smoothed out something. It would probably be best to just get Vista rather than XP64.

Try you, on a Pentium II 350, to make FS98 work better, install Win XP.

If it works well, then yes, vista is the solution to all problems.

Thanks for the information guys I shall have a go with the trial version and let you know next year lol
flyingbartdude