64-bit CAD

[Cluster]

I'm looking into buying a computer to run a AutoCAD. I'd like to know if it will take advantage of a 64-bit processor. I'm in a toss-up on processors, Itanium or XeonMP.

 

[XWRed1]

Well, unless Autocad has been ported to Win64 on Itanium, you wouldn't be able to run it anyhow.

 

[Chris2]

Isn't the Itanium backwards compatible with x86?

 

[XWRed1]

Sort of, but Intel didn't make it good enough for people to do real work on. It performs like a P100 or something.

It would be silly to buy an Itanium just to turn around and run x86 programs.

 

[Cluster]

IF that's the case, xeon's it is then, or maybe hammer's? I may wait to see how these perform on 64-bit and 32-bit operations, and if the go with 4/8-way.

 

[XWRed1]

They should be fast for either, but Autocad is a 32bit app (for now). The hammers go 4 and 8 way on paper, but so did the Athlons, and AMD has only taken those up to 2-way so far. Who knows if the Hammers will make it to 4 and 8 way.