Getting a new dedicated server. Pros and cons of 64-bit OS?

ImagesAndWords

ImagesAndWords

StayblCam.com
Nov 7, 2006
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Scottsdale, Arizona
www.stayblcam.com
Hey people,
I'm getting a new dedicated server this week, mainly to migrate over my Prosper202 install for tracking. Some specs;

- Intel Core i5 quad core
- 4 GB Ram
- CentOS 5

I guess I'm mainly wondering if there's any reason I should not go for the 64-bit CentOS to run this with Prosper202 ? (such as any weird compatibility or performance issues). If stability could become an issue, I rather sacrifice some speed with 32-bit but of course, the choice is obvious if there is no potential issues with 64.

Thanks!
 


You won't be sacrificing much(any) speed by using 32 bit.

But you will only get to use 3G of ram. 1G is reserved for some VM voodoo. Even with the "enable 4g" option in the kernel, you still don't get to use the full 4G.
 
64bit has been fine for quite a few years now. The only three apps that come to mind which don't (correctly) support 64bit are ZRM, Skype and Flash - all of which aren't necessary on a server. Compiling PHP for 64bit has plenty of advantages though.

FWIW i5 isn't server grade. The hyper threading (HT) of i7 is what you want.
 
I always install the 64bit of whatever OS I decide to use as the dedicated server's primary OS. That way when I start creating VPSes they can be either 32bit or 64bit. But if I only have 32bit as the host OS I will only be able to host 32bit containers.

In a server sense, the only noticeable benefit of running a 64bit OS (especially if you're not doing a VPS etc) is the ability to use more than 4GB of rams, access files larger than 4GB, and to take advantage of any code such as compiled binaries optimized for 64bit. (though in terms of real world performance you'd probably only be gaining a 15% to 25% speed increase in some cases, however PHP performance and such will not seem any different)
 
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