amd64 on a P4?

[jel]

I just realized out that the processor of my girlfriend's computer (a 2005 Prescott 2M P4) supports x86-64. Will I see any (substantial) gains if I migrate to amd64? It's used as a desktop computer: WWW-browsing, watching video, playing around with GIMP, a little vmware for virtual Windows XP. Stuff like that.
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# dd if=/dev/urandom of=/dev/sda bs=512

[DawgG]

you'll gain a couple of percents of performance and being able to use more memory. the cost is having to re-install everything and maybe some incompatibilites (most sw is 64-compat, but not all).
a lot of windoze-games that have a linux-version only come as 32-bit.
the way it's used, i'd stick with 32.
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DUMM KLICKT GUT.

[szczerb]

If you stick with the standard amd64 multilib profile then you should run 32bit apps/games just fine (I'm using a 32bit mplayer-bin on my amd64 box because I need to play some weird wmv type videos - works great, also tried running Postal 2 but it just crashes due to my poor intel mobile graphics and it's not yet complete new drivers). Some plugins/effects for gnome might run faster on a 64bit system but it all comes down to how they were written I guess...

[d2_racing]

Reinstalling a Gentoo box on a P4, will take some time for sure.

Maybe you should try and if I were you, you should backup your installation with a Stage 5 and in case of a cash with your new AMD64 installation, then restore your 32 bits installation with the Stage 5

[Nephilim666]

[jel]

Seeing as there isn't much to gain (no big surprise there!) I won't reinstall. I might do a parallell mini install on a spare partition if I'm bored some time. Would be interesting to compare emerge gcc and glibc.

Thanks for your answers!
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# dd if=/dev/urandom of=/dev/sda bs=512

[d2_racing]

Yes here : https://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic-t-534039-highlight-stage.html