What comes first, 64-bit apps or 64-bit OS?

In the case of Vista...

What comes first the 64-bit apps or the 64-bit OS? Well, in the case of a fairly logical world, the 64-bit OS would come along with plans for 64-bit apps to be released soon on the heals of the operating system release, and certainly with the understanding that all apps released for the 32-bit OS should run just fine on the 64-bit OS even if they don't take advantage of the 64-bit features. Sadly that isn't necessarily the case with Microsoft's Windows Vista operating system.

Oh, certainly Vista (and XP before it really) were released in a 64-bit flavor. Heck, there's also 64-bit versions of Windows Server 2003 and later Windows Server 2008. Yay for the 64-bit operating system. Unfortunately, well, there's the problem of where the heck are the 64-bit applications, and worse still, why are there still too many applications that work on the 32-bit operating system but not at all or with seriously reduced functionality when run on the 64-bit version of the same operating system.

As an example, I've been running the 64-bit version of Windows Vista Home Premium on my home theatre/media center PC and for the most part it has worked adequately for my needs. At least such as the case until I wanted to try out a new DVD player software package. A package that installs on my system and then just plain won't run. It tries, but never shows a dialog box, never shows the splash screen, and really doesn't want to cooperate with any add/remove software processes. Argh.

How long as Vista been out now? How long has 64-bit been an option? And why aren't the developers working on making the jump to get to a full-time 64-bit world? Well, because apparently not enough people are running the 64-bit version of Vista to send the message to the developers that they must offer 64-bit versions of their software and applications. It's the old chicken and the egg syndrome. Not enough demand for 64-bit apps because not enough people are using a 64-bit OS, and not enough demand for the 64-bit OS because there just aren't enough applications that would benefit from running 64-bit versus running 32-bit.

Double argh!

At some point down the road we'll have made a transition over to 64-bit, probably at about the time that 128-bit or 256-bit is making a real push to be the next major hardware platform. Until then we'll continue limping along and accepting this half-stepping by the application developers because just don't want to hassle ourselves with making the change from 32-bit over to 64-bit. And in the meantime we'll continue to wonder why our systems really don't perform any better than the ones we had say 5 years ago? Uh, wouldn't that be because we are running 5 and 10 year old applications, and even if we are running newer apps, we're still running the ones that were written for hardware from 10 years ago, right?

Bleh.

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It's the old chicken and the egg syndrome.

I completely agree with you, at some point and time Some one needs to give in and move on. It's time for developers to realize that there is new technology out there and start developing for it. I would love to use my copy of vista 64bit that I paid 10 extra bucks for however at this point it seems to be more trouble than it's worth, with the lack of compatible 3rd party applications.

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What really needs to be done in order to truly push for the 64 bit software is for Microsoft to make only a 64 bit operating system, with no 32 bit versions. The only problem with this is that you would lose alot of sales because most people are just fine and dandy with the 32 bit programs that may have problems working on a 64 bit system and thus wont make the jump.

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The real problem is a businss problem, not a technical problem.

It works like this. The 64-bit OS comes out. If no one migrates to the 64-bit OS, then people writing the software look at their user base and think, "why should I spend the company's time and money developing a 64-bit version of a particular piece of software when most of my consumers are perfectly happy with the 32-bit version."

So as a result the people writing the software wait until there is "critical mass" or to be more simply put, sales start significantly declining because a 64-bit version of the software is not available.

This does sound like a situation that is hopeless, but it is not really. What needs to happen is that someone needs to develop an application that is "killer" and only runs on 64-bit. Like a game that requires 10GB of RAM (that is my prediction BTW for the "killer" application that will move us to Windows Vista 64-bit). Then a bunch of people migrate to 64-bit.

Once that happens then the "critical mass" shifts and companies, from a business perspective, are required to develop new versions of applications that will run on 64-bit in order to keep sales from falling.

With that all said, there are companies (like Stardock) who take a lead on making sure their applications run on 64-bit versions of Windows before it makes sense from a business standpoint. Granted not all of our software runs on 64-bit, but we are trying to get there and make efforts despite the business scenario to keep all of our customers happy. For example this week we are spending time on making WB6.1 and IP4 work on Windows Vista 64-bit.

However, you probably should not expect many other software companies to do go to these great lengths because it many not make sense for their bottom lines.

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