What's The Difference between 32 Bit And 64 Bit OS : Uses And Works

Basically, we know about two types of operating system, First one is a 32-Bit operating system and the second one is the 64-bit operating system.

This actually tells how much memory is accessible from your CPU register for the processor.
->A 32-bit system can reach around 2^32 memory addresses, i.e 4 GB of RAM or physical memory.
->A 64-bit system can reach around 2^64 memory addresses, i.e actually 18-Billion GB of RAM. In short, any amount of memory greater than 4 GB can be easily handled by it.

Here’s the key difference: 32-bit processors are perfectly capable of handling a limited amount of RAM (in Windows, 4GB or less), and 64-bit processors are capable of utilizing much more. Of course, in order to achieve this, your operating system also needs to be designed to take advantage of the greater access to memory. This Microsoft page runs down memory limitations for multiple versions of Windows, but if you’re running the latest version of Windows 10, you don’t need to worry about limits.

With an increase in the availability of 64-bit processors and larger capacities of RAM, Microsoft and Apple both have upgraded versions of their operating systems that are designed to take full advantage of the new technology. The first fully 64-bit operating system was Mac OS X Snow Leopard back in 2009. Meanwhile, the first smartphone with a 64-bit chip (Apple A7) was the iPhone 5s.

Some points you have to remember...

• To install a 64-bit version you need a processor that supports the 64-bit version of OS.
• Using the 64-bit version can help you a lot in multitasking. We can easily switch between various apps without any problem or hanging.
• 64-bit can take care of large amounts of RAM or physical memory more effectively than 32-bit.
• If you have a large amount of RAM(Min. 8 GB) in your PC or Laptop then you can feel the difference between 32-bit and 64-bit OS.
• If you are a gamer and always play high graphics games and work on high-end software than you should go for 64-bit Operating system.

Note-

You can't convert a 32-bit OS into a 64-bit OS because they are built on a different architecture.

The 32-bit OS is also known as X86 or X32 and the 64-bit OS is also known as X64.