Yes, I am using the beta version of Windows XP 2003 64bit, available for 
free from Microsoft to anyone willing to download it (or pay a small fee 
to recieve it on CD).

From what I've heard on the WindowsXP64 board, compiling with the 
optimizations intended for 64bit, or possibly for the AMD64 particularly, 
will increase program execution speed dramatically.  That's what I 
expect, along with a better/faster/more efficient numerical precision 
when using really small, or really large, parameters in object size, 
placement, etc.

I am a web developer using c# and asp...  I don't know much at all about 
compiler optimizations other than what I've read.  What's being written 
is that a program compiled to 32bit will run at simliar speeds on an AMD 
XP and an AMD64 rated similarly.  When that same program is compiled to 
64bit, using the optimizations intended for 64bit, the program will run 
significantly faster on the 64bit processor (and not at all on the 32bit 
processor).

If I'm wrong, then so are a lot of developers posting on the WindowsXP64 
board.  <shrug>  I'm already getting a big boost over the Athlon XP 1800+ 
I was running POV on before, so I'm very satisfied with my upgrade.  If 
there's even a slight possiblity that compiling with 64bit optimizations 
will result in faster code execution, why wouldn't I want to try it?

As soon as .Net is able to be run on Windows XP 64bit, I'd be willing to 
attempt the compile myself (hopefully with help from this group! :).  If 
there's a freeware compiler that can do 64bit executables on Windows XP 
64bit, I'd be willing to try that route also.

Rich

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Rich wrote:
> Yes, I am using the beta version of Windows XP 2003 64bit, available for 
> free from Microsoft to anyone willing to download it (or pay a small fee 
> to recieve it on CD).
> 
> [...]
> 
> As soon as .Net is able to be run on Windows XP 64bit, I'd be willing to 
> attempt the compile myself (hopefully with help from this group! :).  If 
> there's a freeware compiler that can do 64bit executables on Windows XP 
> 64bit, I'd be willing to try that route also.

Do i understand this right, MS offers a free beta version but not a 
compiler suited for generating the appropriate programs (neither free 
nor for $$$)?

You can also have it easier, AFAIK both Linux and FreeBSD are available 
for 64bit AMD.

> From what I've heard on the WindowsXP64 board, compiling with the 
> optimizations intended for 64bit, or possibly for the AMD64 particularly, 
> will increase program execution speed dramatically.  That's what I 
> expect, along with a better/faster/more efficient numerical precision 
> when using really small, or really large, parameters in object size, 
> placement, etc.

Yes, and it will also increase you car's speed, make cows give more milk 
and leads to more sunny days...

SCNR.

Christoph

-- 
POV-Ray tutorials, include files, Sim-POV,
HCR-Edit and more: http://www.tu-bs.de/~y0013390/
Last updated 21 Mar. 2004 _____./\/^>_*_<^\/\.______

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In article <c5ubkf$17b$1@chho.imagico.de> , Christoph Hormann 
<chr### [at] gmxde>  wrote:

> Do i understand this right, MS offers a free beta version but not a
> compiler suited for generating the appropriate programs (neither free
> nor for $$$)?

No, the compiler is available.  You just need to have the usual MSDN
subscription to get early access easily.  Not even sure if you need to sign
an NDA for it currently.

    Thorsten

____________________________________________________
Thorsten Froehlich, Duisburg, Germany
e-mail: tho### [at] trfde

Visit POV-Ray on the web: http://mac.povray.org

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"Thorsten Froehlich" <tho### [at] trfde> wrote in
news:4082b58e@news.povray.org: 

> In article <c5ubkf$17b$1@chho.imagico.de> , Christoph Hormann 
><chr### [at] gmxde>  wrote:
> 
>> Do i understand this right, MS offers a free beta version but not a
>> compiler suited for generating the appropriate programs (neither free
>> nor for $$$)?

As some people on this board are so fond of saying, it's a beta, how can 
you expect everything to work on it?  :)  Visual Studio .Net dose not yet 
install on Windows XP 64bit.  At least not the build I have.

> No, the compiler is available.  You just need to have the usual MSDN
> subscription to get early access easily.  Not even sure if you need to
> sign an NDA for it currently.

I have a Universal subscription to MSDN though work.  Can you tell me where 
the compiler is on subscriber downloads?  Thanks!

Rich

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In article <Xns94CF792EFC3B7spammindspringcom@203.29.75.35> , Rich 
<SrP### [at] ricoswebcom>  wrote:

> As some people on this board are so fond of saying, it's a beta, how can
> you expect everything to work on it?  :)  Visual Studio .Net dose not yet
> install on Windows XP 64bit.  At least not the build I have.

Well, of course not.  What use would the 32-bit compiler on it in the first
place?

> I have a Universal subscription to MSDN though work.  Can you tell me where
> the compiler is on subscriber downloads?  Thanks!

I don't have to download stuff myself from MSDN, somebody else does this and
puts it on the intranet were I work, so I don't know to download location.

    Thorsten

____________________________________________________
Thorsten Froehlich, Duisburg, Germany
e-mail: tho### [at] trfde

Visit POV-Ray on the web: http://mac.povray.org

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Lutz-Peter Hooge <lpv### [at] gmxde> wrote:
> Of course he expects it to be faster. Why? Because he has not an "generic" 
> 64bit processor but a special implementation wich can very well be faster in
> 64bit mode.

  But what exactly is it that makes 64-bit code faster than 32-bit code?
Why are these people expecting it to be?

-- 
plane{-x+y,-1pigment{bozo color_map{[0rgb x][1rgb x+y]}turbulence 1}}
sphere{0,2pigment{rgbt 1}interior{media{emission 1density{spherical
density_map{[0rgb 0][.5rgb<1,.5>][1rgb 1]}turbulence.9}}}scale
<1,1,3>hollow}text{ttf"timrom""Warp".1,0translate<-1,-.1,2>}//  - Warp -

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Rich <SrP### [at] ricoswebcom> wrote:
> From what I've heard on the WindowsXP64 board, compiling with the 
> optimizations intended for 64bit, or possibly for the AMD64 particularly, 
> will increase program execution speed dramatically.

  You have to make a distinction between "a 64-bit compile of POV-Ray"
and "a compile of POV-Ray optimized for AMD64" because these are two
different things.

  Of course you can expect a measurable speedup if you compile POV-Ray
with AMD64-specific optimizations turned on. The AMD64 processor has
new features which a compiler can use to make faster code than with
earlier processors.

  However, in your original post you were just asking for "a 64-bit version
of POV-Ray", which is a different thing. It sounded like you were expecting
a 64-bit version (*any* 64-bit version) to be automatically faster than a
32-bit version.

  I have actually tried compiling a 64-bit version of POV-Ray for the
UltraSparc processor, and it's not faster than the 32-bit version (and
why would it be anyways?). "64-bit code" does not automatically mean
the program will be faster.

  So what you were asking was for an "AMD64-optimized version of POV-Ray".
You should be clear about this to avoid confusion.

>  That's what I 
> expect, along with a better/faster/more efficient numerical precision 
> when using really small, or really large, parameters in object size, 
> placement, etc.

  You are confusing things now.

  In a typical 64-bit CPU the 'long' type as well as pointers will
be 64 bits (the 'int' type will typically still be 32 bits, even though
it also could be 64 bits long, but I have never heard of that).

  However, an FPU is a completely different beast. Even when the CPU is
64 bits, that doesn't need to affect the FPU in any way. The CPU does not
handle floating point arithmetic, the FPU does.
  POV-Ray uses mostly the 'double' type for floating point, which is
64 bits long in all 32 and 64 bit processors.
  Unfortunately your numerical precision is not going to increase by
compiling POV-Ray for the 64-bit processor. The only difference you
will see is that you can make scenes which eat up more than 4 gigabytes
of memory.

> When that same program is compiled to 
> 64bit, using the optimizations intended for 64bit, the program will run 
> significantly faster on the 64bit processor (and not at all on the 32bit 
> processor).

  But that's not because 64-bitness would have some magic in it which would
automatically make code faster. That's because the AMD64 processor has
new features which the compiler can use to make faster code.
  We are still talking about an AMD64-optimized version, not a generic
64-bit version of the program.

> If 
> there's even a slight possiblity that compiling with 64bit optimizations 
> will result in faster code execution, why wouldn't I want to try it?

  That's not the point. The point was that I was trying to correct the
mistaken thinking that "64 bits" has some magic in it which will
automatically make code faster.

-- 
plane{-x+y,-1pigment{bozo color_map{[0rgb x][1rgb x+y]}turbulence 1}}
sphere{0,2pigment{rgbt 1}interior{media{emission 1density{spherical
density_map{[0rgb 0][.5rgb<1,.5>][1rgb 1]}turbulence.9}}}scale
<1,1,3>hollow}text{ttf"timrom""Warp".1,0translate<-1,-.1,2>}//  - Warp -

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Warp <war### [at] tagpovrayorg> wrote in news:4082ce98@news.povray.org:

>   So what you were asking was for an "AMD64-optimized version of
>   POV-Ray". 

My apologies.  I would like to know if anyone has/will/can help with an 
AMD64-optimized version of POV-Ray 3.5 (or Pov-Ray 3.6).

Rich

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Thorsten Froehlich wrote:
> 
> In article <4082906d@news.povray.org> , Warp <war### [at] tagpovrayorg>  wrote:
> 
> >  AFAIK for some reason 32-bit
> > code does not run as fast as 64-bit code in this processor.
> 
> Well, the 64-bit extension is essentially a RISC design except for the
> instruction encoding.  And you get twice as many registers as in 32-bit
> mode.  Not really difficult to optimise for such a design, nor hard to
> implement an efficient core based on a clean RISC archicture ... in
> particular with just 16 registers.

This was the real advantage I was pleased to see in the 64-bit processors.
Being able to keep intermediate results in register makes for a massive
performance boost.

Now a processor that does 3d arithmetic directly would be very nice...

Regards,
John

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On Sun, 18 Apr 2004 19:06:20 +0200, "Thorsten Froehlich" <tho### [at] trfde>
wrote:
> > Do i understand this right, MS offers a free beta version but not a
> > compiler suited for generating the appropriate programs (neither free
> > nor for $$$)?
>
> No, the compiler is available.  You just need to have the usual MSDN
> subscription to get early access easily.  Not even sure if you need to sign
> an NDA for it currently.

No, You can download it from MS site for free without any subscription. 
I have command line environemnt of 64bit VC 7.0 installed since half a year.

ABX

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