32 vs 64-bit software for same machine?

Posted by GorillaSandwich on Super User See other posts from Super User or by GorillaSandwich
Published on 2010-03-24T19:29:55Z Indexed on 2010/03/24 19:33 UTC
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What is the difference between 32 and 64-bit software? My understanding is that 64-bit can use more RAM, if it's available, because it has a larger address space for it.

Is this correct? And, specifically:

  • If I have a 64-bit operating system with lots of RAM, and I install, say, the 32-bit version of MySQL instead of the 64-bit version, will it be unable to use all the available RAM and therefore run slower than the 64-bit version might on the same machine (assuming RAM becomes the bottleneck before processing speed or disk access speed or whatever)?
  • If I have a 32-bit operating system and I install a 64-bit piece of software on it, will it (probably) fail to run?

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