Well, a nub question then...
Some of the up comming games (like ut2007) will be able to handle 64 bit procs. Does that not mean you need a 64 bit os? How does that work?
If they release a 64-bit version, yes you need a 64-bit OS. With XP x64, using an A64 (I would surmise the same for EM64T) it runs in one of the legacy modes, and it sucks for IA-64 because it has to translate all 32-bit code into 64-bit before it can process it. This also means that 64-bit XP, supposedly, can suffer a small or no penalty in performance when running an A64 or EM64T as well. I've been running XP x64 since the first Beta and now I use the Corporate version, I can't notice any performance loss in 32-bit apps but my CPU Performance and Memory Bandwidth (according to SANDRA) is 10% faster.
EDIT: Windows XP x64 and Windows XP 64-bit are different, the former is for x86 while the latter is for Itanium systems. x64 was designed around Server 2003, while Itanium version was designed around Windows XP x86.
EDIT: Some x64 Apps:
7-Zip Archiver
Arctic Torrent BitTorrent CLient
Avast!
Bet On Soldier
COSMOSWorks
Daemon Tools 4.x.x
Diskeeper
Dreadnought
Far Cry
Firefox
Ghostscript
GSview
Half-Life 2
IBM DB2
Internet Explorer 6/7
Java JRE
Lightwave 3D
SQL Server 2005
MinGW
Mozilla Thunderbird
NOD32 Antivirus
O&O Defrag
Oracle 10.2
Peerguardian
POV-Ray
PuTTY
Qliktech
Shadow Ops: Red Mercury
SolidWorks
StyleXP
The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay
Unreal Tournament 2004
VirtualDub
X-Mouse Button Control
I've never had problems w/ Drivers, I don't use a printer but all my other drivers are working fine.
~~Mad Mod Mike, pimpin' the world 1 rig at a time
I heard that I can still get Windows XP Pro X64. Does anyone know where I can get it from I am ver interested in putting it on my raptor drive.