Should 64 bit windows still be avoided for music production?

conti

I haven't looked into this for years, but for a long time whenever I upgraded my laptop I avoided installing 64 bit windows because of the driver signing issues with midi controllers and the problems with some DAW's.

My laptop has a 64bit mobo and I have RAM going to wasted because of the limits of 32 bit, but at least everything works. I need to do a re-install of Windows just because of a build-up of registry issues and failed updates and it just isn't performing as fast as it should and I really want to avail of Windows 64 bit. The only thing stopping me was the fact that hardware that wasn't Microsoft signed would give problems and in some cases just not work at all, which ruled out a lot of products such as Roland and Novation.

Can anyone share pros/cons and general experience with 64 bit, specifically with Ableton, Reason, Cubase, third party plugins such as Sylenth and Native Instrument packages, and hardware that is 64 bit safe?

GTE

conti wrote: »

I haven't looked into this for years, but for a long time whenever I upgraded my laptop I avoided installing 64 bit windows because of the driver signing issues with midi controllers and the problems with some DAW's.

My laptop has a 64bit mobo and I have RAM going to wasted because of the limits of 32 bit, but at least everything works. I need to do a re-install of Windows just because of a build-up of registry issues and failed updates and it just isn't performing as fast as it should and I really want to avail of Windows 64 bit. The only thing stopping me was the fact that hardware that wasn't Microsoft signed would give problems and in some cases just not work at all, which ruled out a lot of products such as Roland and Novation.

Can anyone share pros/cons and general experience with 64 bit, specifically with Ableton, Reason, Cubase, third party plugins such as Sylenth and Native Instrument packages, and hardware that is 64 bit safe?

Win 64 bit is fine. I have been running 64 bit Windows since 2011 with no issues when I moved from Win 7 32 to 64. Cubase 5 and 6.5 ran fine.

For specific products, looking through their respective manuals/websites will show up anything specific which is not 64 bit compatible which is your best bet.

From what can be read on the net, which is not by any means conclusive, XP 64 bit was not that well supported when it came out which is down to the manufacturers of products not getting on that particular bandwagon. That was a long time ago and things have changed so have a look see on the products you use.

Neurojazz

For some DAWS you can get a program called jbridge for plugins that you find are unsupported in 64bit - 99% are fine these days pretty much.

Everything is working a lot better under 64bit.

Dig around for hardware drivers - you might find some are tucked away on the web or available if you contact the makers.

unclebill98

I know a few studios running them and are fine, even one using a Mac but running windows.

eoin5

No issues here!

i57dwun4yb1pt8

win 7 64 is great loads of lurvely ram for samples .

bonoman66

Laptop - Win 8.1 64Bit / 24GB RAM / 1TB Samsung 840 Evo SSD / 512MB Samsung 840 Pro SSD

Protools 11 (Omnisphere / Trillian / RMX / SD 2.0) all running fine & appear to be 'rock solid' stable so far. (Only have this system a few weeks - took a week to load the OS & all software onto it ;-))

old gregg

I've been using Ableton under win 7 64 bit for the last 2 years for composition and gigging and find it rock solid. But much as usual comes down to keeping a music production system for that and that alone.

bonoman66

bonoman66 wrote: »

Laptop - Win 8.1 64Bit / 24GB RAM / 1TB Samsung 840 Evo SSD / 512MB Samsung 840 Pro SSD

Protools 11 (Omnisphere / Trillian / RMX / SD 2.0) all running fine & appear to be 'rock solid' stable so far. (Only have this system a few weeks - took a week to load the OS & all software onto it ;-))

Just an update - I'd only had this Win 8.1 system a few weeks but recently experienced some intermittent / random (no pattern to them at all & not cyclic - could happen anyime) BSOD's with an ntoskrnl.exe. Hadn't got the time to deep dive into the dump files so I went back to Win 7 Prof SP1 64Bit (rebuilt & installed everything from scratch - real pain) & the system has been totally stable again since that. My recommendation would be absolutely a 64 Bit OS but based on my experiences with 8.1, I'd say stick with Win 7 if you have a choice & don't really need to go Win 8.1.