Windows 7 64bit

[cookie_monster]

I'm helping a friend buy a notebook and a few that they like come with Win7 64bit, i'm a bit worried about compatibility issues that they might run into.

 

Opinions from all of you running 64bit Windows 7?

 

 

While were at it anyone bought a new notebook recently in the £400-£600 range that would care to make a recommendation

 

Thanks.

Edited March 3, 2010 by cookie_monster

[srochford]

Running 64 bit Windows 7 on a Lenovo laptop at home and an HP DC7800 desktop at work and it works well.

 

Make sure that drivers are available for any existing hardware - shouldn't be a problem for the actual computer but if you want to use an existing printer, scanner, webcam etc then you might have problems (although big manufacturers are there; my Canon printer works fine as does my HP scanner)

 

No 16 bit software will work - probably not an issue but watch out.

 

If you use One Note then you need to know that "print to One Note" won't work unless you have 64 bit Office 2010 and that brings a whole extra bundle of problems with COM objects etc

 

As ever, check the software you want to use with the hardware and don't buy 64 bit Windows if you've got packages that won't run with it.

[Arthur]

I'm a bit worried about compatibility issues that they might run into.

I've been running the 64-bit version of Windows 7 since it was released (on multiple computers at home and at work) and haven't had any problems with it at all. All the software and games I have tried work perfectly.

 

If they do have old printers, scanners, webcams etc. that do not have 64-bit drivers this would be a good excuse to replace them with something better/faster. Do you know what they will be doing with the new laptop?

[john]

I've used 64 Bit Vista and 7 on my machines at home with no problems at all so I'd not be too worried.

 

All I can say is horrah someones listening to us saying stop selling 4GB Ram PCs with 32bit OS as its a waste of 1GB of RAM

[mossj]

I've used 64 Bit Vista and 7 on my machines at home with no problems at all so I'd not be too worried.

 

All I can say is horrah someones listening to us saying stop selling 4GB Ram PCs with 32bit OS as its a waste of 1GB of RAM

 

Yup but people have started to sucumb to bigger number syndrome...

[EduTech]

I have x64 on my work machine, with 6GB Ram and it works fine with no isses at all i only had to get the graphics driver but that was available anyhow.

 

Regards to software, out of everything i use only thing that i cant get to work is a magicard pronto printer but thats because they dont make a x64 driver for it.

 

Everything else works fine even SIMS.net and Door Access Control System which is nice!

 

James

[Arthur]

Out of everything I use only thing that I can't get to work is a magicard pronto printer but that's because they don't make a x64 driver for it.

The "USB Pass-Through" feature in some virtualisation applications is great for situations like this. I did this with a USB printer using VMware Workstation (Windows 7 x64 host / Windows XP x86 guest) and it worked perfectly. Edited March 4, 2010 by Arthur

[sellerflux]

If you laptop have RAM of 4gb + , go for 64bit , if less than that . 32 bit is your answer.

[Arthur]

^^ There are other benefits to using the 64-bit version of Windows 7 apart from its ability to address more physical memory. Even if you have 2GB-4GB RAM I would still say it's worth using over the 32-bit version.

[cookie_monster]

Don't think this comes with 64bit Win7 but I do like the look of it

 

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[sparkeh]

Been running 64bit Win7 for a while with only minor issues.

Had to download a few updated drivers from manufacturers website but that was about it.