For me, short weeks are the worst to be asked for a favor. Everyone, including me, is gearing up for a day off and it seems like nobody is working to capacity. Trying to fit a favor in at the last minute is always a struggle, but last week it was extra difficult.

I received a call Monday afternoon asking if I could fill in as a guest speaker. “Jeromy,” the scheduler whined, “this will only be a fifteen minute presentation and the subject matter is your call.” Usually I’m given a suggested topic so this week’s should have been a no brainer.

All day I struggled with a subject. Finally, after talking to a customer in one of my stores it hit me. I spent ten minutes explaining a subject I’ve explained ad nauseam so I decided to continue making myself sick and used it as the subject of the presentation. Turns out, sixty four bit technology was a great discussion.

Prior to and in the days of Windows XP, operating systems could process one stream of data. Part of the limitation was hardware related; processors of that era could only handle a single stream of data. Running multiple programs meant one of them would take a backseat if the other called for more resources.

32 bit operating systems, like XP, could handle multitasking quite well even though the hardware it was installed on might not. Somewhere along the way Intel came out with a hyperthreaded processor design that allowed multiple processes to run, and faster ones to pass the slower. This was great running multiple applications at one time.

Dual-core technology was the next big development in processors. True dual-cores were built using 64 bit technology; however, the predominance of operating systems were only 32 bit. This meant the processors were underutilized because they could handle much more capacity than the operating systems could spit out.

Dual-core processors driven by a 32 bit operating system like XP can only use one core at a time. I liken it to having two engines in a car. If I step on the gas one engine will rev at a time and the other will kick in to add power. Paired together, these are a mismatch.

64 bit operating systems to the rescue. Though Microsoft introduced 64 bit prior to Vista, it was really Vista that takes credit for the new addition. 64 bit technology is significantly more efficient at using processor and memory resources than its predecessors.

Back to the car example for a minute. If I step on the accelerator of my car with two engines they both rev simultaneously. I get thrust into the back of my seat, and if I’m lucky I don’t get a ticket. 64 bit technology brings all the cores of the processor up to speed at the same time and allows more data to be processed faster.

Not only does 64 bit technology make better use of the processor, it also allows the processor to better handle memory. Similar to my dual core processor analogy, memory installed in matched pairs will be used more efficiently by the processor and they will talk to each other faster.

Aside from the speed, 64 bit allows computer owners to install significantly more memory than 32 bit versions. There are typically hardware limitations, but I remember reading the theoretical limit of 64 bit systems is around 17 billion gigabytes. Before you go shopping for 17 billion gigabytes of memory, the limit set by Microsoft for their Home operating systems is 16 gigabytes.

(Jeromy Patriquin is the President of Laptop & Computer Repair, Inc. located at 509 Main St. in Gardner. You can call him at (978) 919-8059 or visit www.LocalComputerWiz.com.)