32bit or 64bit

**Dallas2coolio** · April 5th, 2013

If my Sony notebook has 8GB of ram should I use the 64bit version of Ubuntu? It does say it recommends to use 32bit but is it better to use 64bit on machines that has Win 7 64bit? Also my Sony has a Intel i3 2.4gHz processor not AMD but I don't know if that makes a difference. I got the first generation of Intel i3 processor so it was made back in 2010.

**slickymaster** · April 5th, 2013

Read this article, although extensive and may seem a bit dense is quite elucidative: Ubuntu 12.10: 32-bit vs. 64-bit Linux Performance

**Dallas2coolio** · April 5th, 2013

Well why I was asking is that will the 32bit version detect 8gb of ram or will it only detect 3.5gb even I have 8gb like Windows basicly? Also another question is for my netbook I used the 32bit since it has 2gb of ram but will 64bit work on a netbook also?

**QIII** · April 5th, 2013

Hello!

Well why I was asking is that will the 32bit version detect 8gb of ram or will it only detect 3.5gb even I have 8gb like Windows basicly?

Without a PAE (Physical Address Extension) kernel, a 32 bit kernel can only address ~4GB (minus however much is reserved by system or hardware) of memory.

Also another question is for my netbook I used the 32bit since it has 2gb of ram but will 64bit work on a netbook also?

Whether or not it will run a 64 bit kernel is determined by the architecture of the CPU. One of my machines runs 64 bit Fedora just fine with 2GB of memory.

The link given is quite explanatory.

Regards!

Moved to Recurring Discussions.

**slickymaster** · April 5th, 2013

QIII is absolutely rigth. Without a PAE (Physical Address Extension) kernel, a 32 bit kernel can only address 4GB.

If you want to address more than 4 GB you need a 64 bit OS kernel which includes PAE support. PAE increases the address size from 32 bits to 36 bits which means you can address up till 64GB.

**deadflowr** · April 5th, 2013

Go with the 64-bit.
And don't worry 'bout the amd64, it'll run (hopefully

) intel cpus. It's some sort of trademark thing, or something.

**oldos2er** · April 5th, 2013

Originally Posted by Dallas2coolio

If my Sony notebook has 8GB of ram should I use the 64bit version of Ubuntu? It does say it recommends to use 32bit but is it better to use 64bit on machines that has Win 7 64bit? Also my Sony has a Intel i3 2.4gHz processor not AMD but I don't know if that makes a difference. I got the first generation of Intel i3 processor so it was made back in 2010.

I'd run 64-bit on that even if it "only" had 2GB RAM.

The 32-bit recommendation is a bug that likely won't be fixed anytime soon.

**craig10x** · April 6th, 2013

Beats me why it is still called amd 64 because fact of the matter is the 64 bit version runs on both amd and intels....my last laptop and current one both have intel i3 cores and 64 bit is what i have always run!
It may be that originally, amd was first to have 64 bit support and later followed by intel but for some strange reason, ubuntu never updates that in the information on the iso links....they really SHOULD....probably confuses the heck out of "newbies"

**lisati** · April 6th, 2013

It's called "amd" 64 largely for historical reasons. Apparently AMD were the first to add 64-bit capabilities to their cpus before intel did.

**3rdalbum** · April 6th, 2013

Calling it "AMD64" does confuse newbies, as does the "32-bit (recommended)" on the Ubuntu website.

What's wrong with "If your computer has a 64-bit CPU, use this image" and "If your computer has a 32-bit CPU, or you don't know your CPU model, use this image". And then name the 64-bit image "x86-64".