In an attempt to finish out this already too long thread, I think my main
point was that, if a Stata user needs to work with a dataset larger than 2GB
and they work in mac OS X or Win XP, then they could accomplish their work
using a 64bit platform (whether Windows or Linux). I have seen no reports
that using Win64 will suffer any speed deficit, and certainly not a
significant one. Sure, Windows is not great at memory management and
suffers code bloat and isn't elegant, but many people use it by choice or
force or convenience and still seem to be able to function in modern society
and get work done. As someone with tasks to accomplish on time/budget, I
find it much more cost-effective to buy more RAM or a new computer and use
software tools such as Stata, than to spend endless hours writing source
code.
