Thanks for for everyone's input so far. I'm still
undecided, but leaning slightly towards sticking with
the the 32-bit operating system. One thought I have
is that I can later add a second hard drive with the
ability to boot a 64-bit OS from there. I'm not a
computer whiz, though, so I don't how feasible or easy
that would be.
Right now, I'm hesitant to take the 64-bit plunge
because I feel like I might spend more time resolving
application and driver issues than I would save by
using 64-bit Stata. I've already spent too much time
as it is planning this new computer purchase.
Any further comments or advice would be welcomed,
I'll be making the purchase on Monday.
Thanks for the help. I realize this is more of a
computer question than a Stata question, but since my
primary goal is to improve Stata performance (while at
the same time minimizing difficulties of running other
programs), your insights are very useful.
Matissa
--- M Hollis <[email protected]> wrote:
I'm hoping to get some advice about Windows x64.
I've
got money to buy a new desktop and I'm looking to
get
a pretty fast computer to reduce my time waiting for
Stata do-files to finish. I have recently been
running a computationally intensive analysis that
takes about 48 hours to complete on my
run-of-the-mill
desktop, but more often I'm running analyses of
large
datasets like 1.5 million observations from the
Current Population Survey, which can take 45 minutes
to an hour to run.
I think I have the computer picked out, a Dell
Precision 490 with two dual-core processors (our
school only buys Dells). I'll get Stata/MP for
4-processors to compliment the system.
My final decision is whether to go with regular
Windows XP or with Windows XP x64 for a 64-bit
system.
I know many of you are Linux folks, but I'm not
really up to making that plunge right now. From
what
I understand, Windows x64 offers the potential to be
faster, but it also creates some software and
hardware
compatibility problems. It seems like some of the
compatibility problems are being solved over time,
but
it's not clear to me whether the gains of Windows
x64
outweigh the potential headaches. The choice of
operating systems doesn't impact the cost.
So, I'm wondering if folks have experience with
Windows x64. If so, does it make a big difference
in
running Stata? Is it worth the trouble negotiating
all the other compability problems?
Thanks for your input.
Matissa
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