Most Linux distros went 64 bit many years ago. MS Windows is so far behind in this area because of third party software.
Huh, what? MS have done a good job of making the choice between 32 and 64 bit largely irrelevant. There's so much software that doesn't need to be 64 bit, so why bother compiling it for 64 bit? Especially as MS have made it painless for end users to mix both on their 64 bit PC.
The only performance advantage with 64 bit software is that the SSE part of Intel processors give you more floating point registers in a 64 bit process than a 32 bit process running on the same chip gets. This is probably an artificial constraint Intel designed in to make their early 64 bit CPUs look a lot faster than their 32 bit ones, a marketing drive to make 32 bit generally look obsolete and undesirable. And judging by your post, that marketing worked.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
