At the recent Windows Hardware Engineering Conference, Microsoft’s Bill Gates said that the 64-bit transition will happen “rapidly.”

I’ve been a fan of AMD and its 64-bit chips since their introduction, even building my own Athlon 64-based box and running (or trying to run) Microsoft’s 64-bit beta. While my inner Early Adopter tells me that this transition is long overdue, my logical side thinks, “Hey. For what you’re doing with the systems, 32 bits is just fine.” My needs are minimalist, however, compared to those of the engineering community.

While Windows XP Pro x64 sounds good, a) Most users will likely be in my position, simply because what they have now works just fine; b) Who wants to go through another major shift in applications? Worse than the upgrade costs of the apps themselves (even though, thankfully, Intel admitted that AMD’s path—which now includes faster backward compatibility with 32-bit apps—was the correct one) are the deployment and administration costs that medium to large organizations will incur. Again, is it worth it for now?

AMD has thickened the plot with its recent announcement of the dual-core, 64-bit Opteron.

Today, hardware is running ahead of software. During the 16- to 32-bit transition, this was reversed: we needed the hardware, desperately, even for general office use. Today, who needs to run Office faster? Even AutoCAD runs well on a properly outfitted 32-bit box. In either case, slowdowns can usually be addressed by throwing more memory at it. It’s not until you look at engineering simulation, banking/finance, and scientific apps that there’s a 32-bit problem. (Which Intel says is not so much related to ’64-bitness’ as it is the larger amount of memory that 64-bit chips will address.)

What about Linux, which has been running in a 64-bit space for years? It’s easy to find articles touting Linux and Apple’s OSs as more capable, polished, and stable than Windows. What do you think? I think most people would agree that Apple’s OS X variants are elegant and powerful compared to Windows. In my fairly limited experience with recent Macs, they’ve become more Windows-like not only in terms of interface but instability. Mac OSs crash more often for me than does Windows. Or is it just me? Beyond elegant and (UNIX-based) powerful, the market numbers just aren’t there for OS X-whatever and Linux, even in the engineering space. Why? If Windows is as horrendous as many contend, why is it by far the global market leader in terms of implementations and applications? Some would disagree with that comment, of course.

While I think the slow transition to AMD’s 64-bit chips is worthy of note, the world’s most popular OS hasn’t been available. So, it’s tough to take the position that Gates is wrong on his rapid implementation comments. I think he is, but only time will tell.

Instead of going on and on about this, I’d like to respectfully turn the tables.

Is 32-bit working for you, or do you require the extra horsepower and memory addressing offered by 64?

Have you already moved to (or tried) boxes based on AMD’s 64-bit chips? Do you plan to move to or trial-run 64-bit machines based on either Intel or AMD technology?

If so, when? If not, why?

Do you currently run Windows, Linux, or ? If you access machines running different OSs, to which do you turn when the going gets tough? DO you expect this will change?

Are you or, to your knowledge, your IT department planning on a shift to Windows 64 or are you waiting for Longhorn?

See? Not a single rant in sight. We’re depending on your feedback, as we always do.