Quote Originally Posted by Alex F View Post
For some applications it is completely OK to leave them 32 bit. Some applications can run much better on x64 computer with large physical memory, when they are compiled in 64 bit. Otherwise, what is the point in using 64 bit processor?
The point is that a 64-bit processor has 64 bit instructions that can make stuff go faster (or easier). Problem with this is that not a lot of programmers actually use them or even know how to use them. And yes, the memory addressing is bigger. Besides those options, there isn't a lot more. Same as the multi-core cpu's. If your app is not aware of them (and thus not using the parallel processing options), multi-core isn't a big enhancement. Bought a 6core phenom II a few weeks ago, and now I can perfectly see in my taskmanager (ubuntu) that usually 2-3 core are doing absolutely nothing.