32-Bit vs 64-Bit Ubuntu

All users who can use it are better off using the 64-Bit version of Ubuntu. The main difference has to do with how a computer processor is able to register and use memory, but speed is also a factor. Here is why.

A computer with a 32-Bit processor will be able to use a maximum of 4GB of memory (actually a bit less, but this is a more practical-focused book and not a computer science text, so the approximation is close enough for our uses). A computer with a 64-Bit processor will be able to use up to a theoretical limit of 17 billion GB. More memory addresses means that you can store more data in RAM, which is much faster than processing it while reading from and writing to disks or other storage media.

If you are dealing ...

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