64-bit Linux

[teapot]

I have an E6300 CPU which supports EMT64 instructions.
I'm currently running Gentoo Linux 32-bit.

What are the pros/cons with "upgrading" to 64-bits ?
Performace, driver-compability , etc.

I have to use 32-bit binaries (Matlab) that probably won't be avialable in 64-bit versions.
How does the backward compability work in everyday use?

The computer is my main workstation and file server at home built with stability and performance in mind. The box is
powered on almost 24/7. ( Current uptime: 5d 13h )
Is 64-bit Linux considered ready to use on non-experimental computers?

Should I upgrade or not?

[i92guboj]

The 32 bits compatibility is near perfect.

You just need to make sure that you have all the required libraries in a 32 bits version.

You can use also octave, which is in portage, it is supposed to be compatible with matlab. Never tryed any of those, though, so can't comment on how fair is the comparison. About drivers, expose which one do you need and we might be able to help you. The usual stuff, like nvidia drivers, works ok.

For the rest, there is not much difference between the two arches. The main advantage of amd64 is that the compilition times are decreased. For the daily work, there is no noticeable difference for the most part. Though in some specific tasks there is a speed boots, for example, video encoding.

EDIT, anyway, you should keep in mind that you can always install into an spare partition, or even into a loopback filesystem, and decide yourself.

[teapot]

So 64-bit is faster when compiling .. how come ?
Does this apply in general?
When does the extra 32-bits become a disadvantage?

I have no exotic hardware really.

Gainward Nvidia 7300 GFX
Both SATA and PATA hdd.
Abit Ab9 965 mobo.

The motherboard with the intel ICH8 and Jmicron hdd controllers has been problematic to setup to express things mildly.
But I don't think 64-bit would make it worse or better.

Octave is good , but I also need to run Maple which don't have an open-source counterpart.

[energyman76b]

amd64 has the double amount of registers. So everything register heavy should be faster (should, not have to be).

But everything is bigger too. Binaries, data. The memory bus becomes a bottleneck fast. Especially with a chip that still uses a FSB

Ifg you want ot use 32bit apps. Just do a multilib install and install the emul-libs, like app-emulation/emul-linux-x86-baselibs
or
app-emulation/emul-linux-x86-compat
or
app-emulation/emul-linux-x86-gtklibs
or
app-emulation/emul-linux-x86-xlibs

there are a lot more.
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[i92guboj]

[teapot]

[quantumsummers]

Yo teapot,

Matlab has 64 bit support, and so does Mathematica! I use both for work, fun, etc, on both AMD64 and EM64T. We even run it in 64 bit on our Cray XG-1 (48 dual core Optys). In using x86_64, the worst thing is using firefox-bin and mplayer-bin, but then thats not even a big deal. At least the 32bit codecs work with that, and until everyone takes advantage of 64 bit libraries, its the main stream. Additionally, hardware virtualization is beautiful on x86_64.

As an aside, I was running a Matlab neural net training session on an AMD64 3500+ for about 100K epochs (~10 hours) on a gigantic set of inputs (something like 30 x 20000), and the machine had zero lag, even though it was clocked at 100%. A beauty when compared to WinBloze which under the same circumstances is so bogged down it is unusable, and its a single core cpu. Who said single core couldn't multitask?

I've never really used Octave much but it looks nice. Don't know about Maple either as I use Matlab, Mathematica, and now java for mathematics related work.

Hope this is encouraging, you really gotta try Gentoo x86_64! I've never looked back.

Cheers,
QuantumSummers
_________________
Summers

"...there are no rules here -- we're trying to accomplish something."
- Thomas A. Edison

[teapot]

*installing right now*

(instead of sleeping)