Bootcamp: questions about 32bit & 64bit

I have a MBP 13" with 4GB of RAM, and as we all know, it uses the 9400m integrated graphics chip. I was wondering if I'd get more graphics performance if I used a 64bit version of windows as opposed to 32bit.

I want to play Left 4 Dead.

mhmmhello said:

I have a MBP 13" with 4GB of RAM, and as we all know, it uses the 9400m integrated graphics chip. I was wondering if I'd get more graphics performance if I used a 64bit version of windows as opposed to 32bit.

I want to play Left 4 Dead.

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I think that would depend on whether Left for Dead was a 64 bit application. I'm no expert in this area though...

Have you tried it on a 32 bit OS?

Rimmer said:

I think that would depend on whether Left for Dead was a 64 bit application. I'm no expert in this area though...

Have you tried it on a 32 bit OS?

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Yes, i've tried it with WinXP 32bit. It handled everything on medium-high, but I also tried medium and low. The game would play smoothly for a bit, but then the frame rate would drop very briefly. I just thought that if I had a 64bit OS, it would run better since it would recognize all 4GB of ram.

Recognizing 4GB of ram, and using 4GB of ram are two entirely different things. Further, most GPU intensive games (L4D would qualify) primarily use the GPU for rendering/performance. While Valve does provide 64 bit versions of their games I don't believe this will make any noticeable difference as the GPU you are running is limited.

The only real benefit you could possibly get from this is that (and I have never used an integrated card to run FPS games so don't quote me on this) integrated cards rely on system memory for rendering/buffering video. However, most games won't use more than 500-1GB of memory and as you already have 4GB I am not sure you would see much of a difference in a 32/64 bit build.

Also, the video driver is important for performance so this would have to provide improvements as well in the 64 bit environment.

I just thought that it'd have more memory to work with for in-game calculations and stuff. But I see what you're saying.

eh games will work pretty much the same whether your running 32 bit or 64 bit versions of Windows, most games are more GPU dependant that processor dependant nowadays for graphics, and as far as RAM use goes, games normally use what's listed in their system requirements, not much over if at all.

I agree - I don't think any performance increase will be noticeable given the limitations of the integrated graphics chip (vs. a separate graphics adapter). That's the big limit. You might even lose performance if the 64-bit driver has issues. I think you're better off sticking with 32-bit.

Cheers