Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit, PC games in general and FS9 i particular

[Jesper]

Hi

With my 15 year old son now as a 'pressure group' (He's of the opinion that games like Medieval II 'Total War' could look much better than on my current rig ;-) I feel that I cannot stand against the pressure. And thus have to invest in a new gamer rig. *sigh* :mixedsmi:

So, I'm about to invest some of my savings in a new rig with these main specifications:

Motherboard: Gigabyte X58A motherboard (USB3.0 and SATA3)
Ram: Kingston 6GB DDR3-1333 TriChannel RAM
Harddisk: Seagate 1000GB S-ATAII 3Gb/s Fluid Silent 7200rpm
Grafik: ATI Radeon HD5850 1GB GDDR5 RAM PCI-E

The question is: Should I choose Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit or Windows 7 Home Premium 32-bit?

I'm under the impression that the 64 bit version can be - for some older games like CFS2 - troublesome? As well as some driver issues can appear?

What are your experiences? With FS9?

Take care

J

[Z-claudius24]

Hi,

Just out of curiosity .. what kind of power unit for run all this stuff ?
EDIT
CPU ?

[SdC Redux]

There are very few problems related to 32 or 64 bit.
32 bit applications (like cfs2/fs9; I run those just fine on w7x64) just don't take advantage of 64 bit instructions. CPU clockspeed is important for older games, not the number of cores.
Driver issues were mostly under XP/Vista x64, when the manufacturers on average just didn't do a good job on the 64 bit drivers. That is not the case any more with win7x64; it's gone mainstream now.

[Jesper]

Hi,

Just out of curiosity .. what kind of power unit for run all this stuff ?

Hi Claudius24

The specifications says: 750W Gaming ATX Power Supply super silent 17dB High-end.

[Jesper]

There are very few problems related to 32 or 64 bit.
32 bit applications (like cfs2/fs9; I run those just fine on w7x64) just don't take advantage of 64 bit instructions. CPU clockspeed is important for older games, not the number of cores.
Driver issues were mostly under XP/Vista x64, when the manufacturers on average just didn't do a good job on the 64 bit drivers. That is not the case any more with win7x64; it's gone mainstream now.

Thanks for your reply Redux. I'll go for the 64 bit with no worries then.

BTW - and please bear with me, I'm just a PC user with only little knowledge of the 'nuts and bolts' of a PC - in which order do FS9/CFS2 use the graphic card, ram and CPU?

Which piece of hardware does which part of the job of running FS9/CFS2? And is it different from game to game?

[SdC Redux]

Thanks for your reply Redux. I'll go for the 64 bit with no worries then.

BTW - and please bear with me, I'm just a PC user with only little knowledge of the 'nuts and bolts' of a PC - in which order do FS9/CFS2 use the graphic card, ram and CPU?

Which piece of hardware does which part of the job of running FS9/CFS2? And is it different from game to game?

Older games generally use the CPU more than the video card's processer (GPU) ; more recent versions of DirectX use more instructions directly on the GPU), like the compositing of the terrain textures.
Older games are made for older computers with less RAM than the 6GB you plan to use. Don't expect the old games to actually use that RAM; my CFS2 loaded with 4GB of addons barely uses more than 256MB. And only a single core of the CPU, obviously. When I have CFS2 running, it doesn't seem to matter at all that I have many other applications running at the same time (word, visual studio, photoshop etc.) , Windows 7 is really good in that aspect.
P.S. you NEED 64bit OS to use more than 4GB RAM

[SteveB]

I moved to windows 7 ultra 64 last November, no real problems with fs9 and even my old Unreal tournament works fine. The only thing I have had problems with running is fsx, wasted over a month trying to get it happy and gave up on it.
the 64 bit windows also recognises 8GB of ram whilst 32 bit will only recognise 4GB. I installed my fs9 straight into my C: rather than into the over protected programme files (x86) folder, it wouldnt let me add any addon scenery whilst in the proggie files folder. moved too the route directory of c: and no problems at all.

Steve

[Jesper]

Hi,

Just out of curiosity .. what kind of power unit for run all this stuff ?
EDIT
CPU ?

Hi claudius24

The spec says: Intel® Core™ i7-930 4x2.80GHz 4,8GT/sec

[TeiscoDelRay]

I run 64 bit win 7 with no probs,,Fs9 works great and it is under program files, I don't use the x86 program file name,,just good old program files.

[edmoore235]

Greetings,
Run Windows 7 Ultimate 64 bit with good results. Minor problems with OLD installers that are 16 bit but I am very happy with 64 bit OS. Good luck.

Ed

[Jesper]

Thank you for your inputs gentlemen. Much appreciated :mixedsmi:

[casey jones]

I have had big trouble with installing FS9, firts I let the FS9 program install to the folder it picked which was program xi86? I had a time trying install my airports and planes it just would not let me install, then I tried useing the C: programs to install FS9 what I got was FS9 scattered everywhere, please help.

Thank you

Casey

[PilatusTurbo]

Hey Jesper,

You'll easily want a nice Antec or Corsair 650 or 750 watt power supply for all that hardware, and one more thing:

This may be a personal opinion, but I believe it's a valuable piece of advice. Go AMD. You'll get WAAAY more processor for your buck. I used to be a die-hard Intel fan, until my older bro talked me into buying AMD. I needed a replacement processor, and the equivalent Intel was $60 dollars more for slightly less specs. Since I was on a budget at that time, I chose an AMD Phenom X2 550 Black Edition processor (Dual Core 3.1 Ghz) for only $104!! It's been the most kick ass processor I've ever had. Intel makes a solid product, but you're paying waaay too much for their name. AMD also makes a very respectable processor, at prices that can't be beat. Also, if you go the quad core route with AMD as my brother did, you can easily get an X4 965 Black Edition 3.4 Ghz Quad Core for around $180. Too pricey? Get the X4 955 for around $160 which runs a solid 3.2 Ghz quad. That Intel you want retails for $300 after shipping at Newegg, and probably more at Frys.com.

Black Edition processors aren't given that cool name for no good reason. BE processors have the Godlike unlocked multiplier. This means, given aftermarket cooling and solid motherboard and ram, you can overclock the crap outta these AMD's quite safely.

I went AMD, and never will go back. Your choice on a Gigabyte is also a respectable one; I bought a $110 Gigabyte 790XT-UD4P, and love everything about it. So easy to overclock. :ernae:

[attaway]

Hi Casey:

You'll need administrator priviliges to copy your files over to a 'program files' directory in windoz 7. Take a look at 'change user account control settings' and 'change user type' in the 'user accounts' control panel.

I have had big trouble with installing FS9, firts I let the FS9 program install to the folder it picked which was program xi86? I had a time trying install my airports and planes it just would not let me install, then I tried useing the C: programs to install FS9 what I got was FS9 scattered everywhere, please help.

Thank you

Casey

[casey jones]

I followed your instructions all is well I guess it is another of MS way of making things harder the what they are. Again my thanks to you.

Cheers

Casey