64-bit OS world, is it ready yet?
Recently did an entire system upgrade, involving an SLI motherboard with a AMD64 processor. I've heard incredible things about the AMD64 native 32-bit processing and have greatly enjoyed it's ability to workhorse with whatever I throw at it. Won't bore you with the specs, just know that it's AMD64 bit.
However I've heard nothing but bad reviews and experiences of 64-bit OSes. From Gento AMD64 and Debian64 it seems as if the OS itself is wonderfully pre-compiled (or in gentoo's case.. not so much) for 64bit hardware, but a lot of common programs are refusing to run without resorting to a few nasty hacks. Now, as a slackware long-time user, nasty-hacks leave me with that feeling of grimy instability lurking just around the corner. I don't feel like hand-hacking firefox code to run everything but the macromedia program in 64 bit, leaving 32 code for the flash plugin.
The same seems to apply with Windows 64-bit.
Which brings me to my question:
It seems the primary advantage of the 64-bit processors are moreso focused on larger amounts of RAM allocated to program usage (when a singular program uses more than 2 gigs, for instance) versus true program latency and responsiveness. If this is true, then would it be wiser to stick to my tried-and-true 32 bit OSes that have native capability (not emulation or conversion, amd 64 does 32bit natively) and program stability? Or is there additional speed improvements and happy times that I am missing about 64-bit processors?
Keep in mind that I am focusing moreso on desktop/workstation usage and not mainframe or critical server implimentations.