Taking my e6410 dell from 32 to 64 bit

Question

Am I going to see a major performance boost on Microsoft Office and Dev/DB apps if I switch up from 32-bit to 64-bit Windows on my Dell E6410 i5?

Unless you are loading up a a 20GB database, then no. You might actually see slower performance.

Doc · Answer 1 · 2011-07-07 22:11:30Z

I doubt it, especially if your total memory available is near 4GB. It's actually possible that you could experience a slow down from that upgrade.

If you've got near or more than 4GB, I think it'll start to become worth it.

Ignacio Vazquez-Abrams · Answer 2 · 2011-07-07 22:12:13Z

up vote 3 down vote

No. Productivity and development tools are the least likely to benefit from the 64-bit advantages since they are heavily dependent on user input.

answered Jul 7 '11 at 22:12

	I was told Word did better with more RAM, and I'm limited to 4gb with 32-bit Windows. Though I'm not super convinced an SSD wouldn't pep things up. – Caveatrob Jul 8 '11 at 5:00
	Word does better when you go from 256MB to 512MB. At 4GB you're throwing a pebble into the ocean. Besides, it's not limited to 4GB per se; there are artificial limits built into the various Windows SKUs. – Ignacio Vazquez-Abrams Jul 8 '11 at 5:02
	There are no artificial limits in the 32 bits versions. The most commonly encountered limit is around 3.5 GB, as you cannot have 4GB of RAM and a videocard in only 4GB of address space. – MSalters Jul 8 '11 at 12:35
	@MSalters: Perhaps you're not familiar with Microsoft's list of memory limits. – Ignacio Vazquez-Abrams Jul 8 '11 at 16:27

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