64 bit ram limit theory

[gothicknight]

So as we all know, 32 bit processors and the operating systems had an upper limit to memory of 4 gigabytes, which can be figured out through a few simple equations, but wouldn't this mean that 64 bit would have a huge ammount of memory that could be added to it. Lets start with how many bits

2^64th is 1844674077000000000 bits
which is 235843009000000000 bytes
which comes out to 2517998140000000 kilobytes
2199023256000 megabytes
2145483648 gigabytes
2097152 terrabytes
2048 Pettabytes
which in the end is equal to 2 Zettabytes, which is an ungodly ammount of ram when you think of what the current standards are, this would allow for applications to go alot more in detail, as well as games themselves to have more variables involved in the programming to produce more particles and alot of other things, though how long will it be till we reach this ammount of ram, is probably the best question at the moment

[General Edor Crespin]

I think that by the time we got to the point where that was possible, and everything else is there, we'd be pretty close to "virtual reality"-like systems, if not there already.

[boardryder]

I was thinking of testing out the xp64 OS... Wow, I never knew the names above a terabyte... I think they should force 64 bit pretty soon and get the drivers squared so we can tap that... uhhh... potential we've been hearing so much about.

[MrBored]

64bit processors don't support full 64bit memory allocation, I think its limited to 48bit or something on the AMDs and 36bit on the Intels. Thats the reason XP64 only supports 128GB of ram, its Intels fault.

[King Speedy]

It's 2 exabytes. Zetta comes after that.

[iplayguitar]

Thats the reason XP64 only supports 128GB of ram, its Intels fault.
only 128GBs :rolleyes: , damn i dont think there is any need for more than that at the moment.

id hold off on xp64 due to the lack of driver support. i think we will start seeing more drivers when vista 64 comes out next year.

[san_pali]

Thats the reason XP64 only supports 128GB of ram, its Intels fault.

128 GB........that's bigger than my disk!! :(
i feel so poor :p

[amirin]

may i know why it's intel's fault?

*grabs the why i hate intel list*

[Bhazard]

I found drivers for all my shit, but I'm worried about gaming, and all the programs use. Do you think I will have compatibilty issues? Will all the programs I use now(XP Pro SP2), work with the 64bit edition?

[iplayguitar]

punkbuster didnt work for some of my games on xp64.

[boardryder]

hows bout stuff like HL2 and anarchy online? i think i will wait since i don't wanna f up my raid config, and play everything w/o worries. of course, regular xp pro isn't bulletproof either. Only 128gb? well, looks as though i won't be needing all 128 sticks. and i thought it was such a good purchase... :rolleyes:

[iplayguitar]

sell me some of your megabytes :)

hl2 kinda sorta worked, only after i went through alot of tweaking did i get it to run. i dont think xp64 is supported by valve right now anyways. or atleast it wasnt when i tried.

[gothicknight]

still with programming becoming more advanced as it is now, larger ammounts of memory will be needed, since every single particle that is created by something has to have memory allocated from ram for its locaton info, and video ram for its video display, so in the next few years we may start moving into the much larger ammounts of gigabytes, and yes its 2 exabytes