Why didn't XP 64b take off?

[Hondo=TFD=]

It's such a good OS, why didn't XP 64 progress more?

[Scubar]

driver support, or total lack thereof

[Chickenfeed]

When XP launched the majority of cpus in the market didn't support 64bit instructions. Standard memory amounts were also a fraction of what they are today, ie 1GB was high end. Software devs didn't feel it was worth the resources to write 64bit as it was a very small niche market. No consumer systems were running it.

Even with Vista launching in a period where most machines had 64bit cpus, 32bit windows was still the status quo. It wasn't until memory prices were low enough for 4GB to be entry level that we would see 64bit take over and that happened with 7.

I tried quite hard to get XP 64 to a functional state years ago but the spoty/low quality driver support was the nail in the coffin for me.

[tiro_uspsss]

It's such a good OS, why didn't XP 64 progress more?

because of uninformed posts on forums (see previous)

XP64 was the bee's knee's back in the day - it shared the same kernel as WinServer 2003 x64 R2 - hence why it is so stable & fast!
Back in the days of K8, I installed XP64 with many various different types of hardware, never had a problem finding drivers - the only hardware that I came across without drivers was the VIVO chip that Nvidia had on their 7800 series cards.

XP64 remained my fav OS till W7. Fav OS now is WinServer 2012

[CrazyNutz]

Large amounts of memory ( i.e > 3.5-4gb) and large file systems we're not super common for desktops during XP's time. This is the main reason why it did not take off.

[i found nemo]

how many people back in the athlon ( k8 ) days were running around with 500gb hdds? file systems? ntfs even if it's on win 8 7 xp ect ect is still ntfs. even the super fetch that was a key feature in win vista, could be enabled in xp via registry edit. as far as drivers win xp still receives driver updates ( 64 or 32 bit ) for most mainstream manufacturers.

the actual reason xp no longer mainstream is because there's only so much you can do with kernels before you just have to move on. r.i.p xp :p

[EniGmA1987]

because of uninformed posts on forums (see previous)

XP64 was the bee's knee's back in the day - it shared the same kernel as WinServer 2003 x64 R2 - hence why it is so stable & fast!
Back in the days of K8, I installed XP64 with many various different types of hardware, never had a problem finding drivers - the only hardware that I came across without drivers was the VIVO chip that Nvidia had on their 7800 series cards.

XP64 remained my fav OS till W7. Fav OS now is WinServer 2012

I ran Windows XP 64-bit for a very long time, almost since it was first released. At home and at work. The main issue was most definitely drivers. As long as you had all the latest hardware then sure drivers were not usually the problem, but if the hardware was more than a year old then you were lucky to find a driver and very lucky if the driver worked well. The worst issues were audio and printer drivers. It took a good few years to get to a place where drivers werent really an issue anymore, and by that time Vista was releasing which is probably what helped the 64-bit driver development a bit.

But your right, it definitely was fast and stable. I enjoy Windows 7 quite a lot, but XP x64 is probably still my favorite OS.

[WangChung]

Just thought I'd chime in. I've been running XP x64 since it came out until literally this week. There was some windows update that borked my NET framework and rather than pounding my head with hunting down drivers for a repair/reinstall I'm just going to get Win7 x64. It's been an awesome run up until the last 6 months really, never any problems. Just kicking myself that I didn't buy an extra Win7 license under my school discount when I could, when I paid $65 for the first one paying $125 just seems expensive now. Though, for the functionality it's really not that bad of a price especially if I keep 7 for another almost decade like I did XP.

[chinaguy]

I ran XP 64 for 2-3 years on my PC at work and at home when it was first released, but there was no real need to run 64 bit software at the time. There was no software advantage in 64 bit outside the server room or a limited number of packages in the commercial world of music/video/publishing.

Today is a different matter with my toaster oven having 16GB of ram and an internet connection!

Now I can pick up 4GB for $25 UDS, in the year 2000 that would have been near $500 USD. We all need a 64bit OS today.

[josh1980]

I used XP64 back in the day. I had problems with finding drivers for some of my hardware. When Vista came out I refused to upgrade. Even now, I never used Vista on any of my machines and I wouldn't(and still won't) help friends or family that use Vista.

When Vista came out it had both a 32 and 64 bit version. It really seems like 2 things happened when Vista came out. Either your hardware was abandoned and you were left having to buy new hardware to get Vista to work with it or the manufacturers updated their drivers. For whatever reason when a lot of manufacturers updated to Vista they also finally provided an XP64 driver. This was great for me. But some software still didn't work on XP64 and some drivers were just never updated.

For me, I wouldn't say that the "migration" to a 64 bit OS was really underway until Windows 7. Even with Vista, it seemed that the "standard" machines ran 32-bit while the "premium"(read: more expensive) machines were 64-bit. Back then a lot of people didn't see the reason to spend the extra money for 64-bit so they didn't.