May 9, 2005                                                                                                                                                    

x64 OUT AND RAM DOWN

It’s finally here and it’s relatively inexpensive.  Windows XP 64 bit is now available in the OEM flavor.  It is only about $3 more expensive than the 32 bit version.  The bad news is, Microsoft is making it a download to your customers for only $12.  However, there are some things you need to be aware of before jumping on the 64 bit band-wagon.

 1.)  x64 will only work on systems running a 64bit processor.  Athlon64, Opteron, P4 and Xeon w/ EM64T are the only processors supported.  Even the Intel Itanium is not supported.  The good news is, although a 64 bit processor is required x64 will run older 32bit applications.

 2.)  You cannot do an “upgrade” from the 32 bit version.  You must format the hard drive.  Even though Microsoft is calling this an upgrade, it is really a replacement.

 3.)  If the system was purchased through an OEM or system builder, the installation of x64 will at least void the support portion of the warranty.  The manufacturer will no longer provide support for the operating system because it  was not sold with the system.  We have yet to see anything relating to the hardware warranty.

 On another note, RAM has once again taken a nose dive in price.  DDR appears to be the only category affected.

 The interest in the Carputer has been very high.  We now have a working version for demo purposes installed and expect to have the finalized version installed shortly.  Feel free to come by and check it out. 

 Lastly, we recently replaced our mail server and we have had some difficulty configuring the new one.  Spam has become a huge annoyance.  Training the spam filter has caused us to lose some email.  If you recently sent us email and didn’t get a response try again or give us a call.      

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