| yum123 said: x86 what the hell. isnt that 32bit. I thought in this day and age everything is in 64bit or x64/ Can anyone explain in details whats happening with this decision. and what the differences/benefits are of x86 |
This is two different naming conventions. CPU naming and Software complience naming. x86 refers to the line of CISC based CPUs produced by Intel/AMD; this comes from before the Pentium/Fusion/Athelon/iSeries monkiers when they used names like 486, 386 for the CPU's..... The new versions of the CPU's come only as 64-bit based(32-bit bc), though they have been 4-bit(8088, 8086), 8-bit(186/286), 16-bit(386/486) and 32-bit(586 onward, or the Pentium series) in the past.
x64 is a software naming "convention" and referes to software made to run natively, or fully take advantage of, 64-bit processors.
