(May-30-2017, 07:28 PM)Larz60+ Wrote: [ -> ]well, for one, the range of 64 bits is oxffffffff or 4,294,967,295 decimal
and 32 bits is 0xffff or 65,535 decimal
Uh?
0xffff is 16 bits,
0xffffffff is 32 bits (a hex digit covers 4 bits).
right, I'm losing my bits
Oh, I thought you were losing your shift :)
When 64 bit processors compatible with the x86 architecture were introduced, they were referred to as x86-64. x86-32 (and x86-16) were used for the 32 (and 16) bit versions. This was eventually shortened to
x64 for 64 bit and x86 alone refers to a 32 bit processor. The 32 bit processors are designed to handle a limited amount of physical memory maximum of 4GB but 64 bit can handle high memory utilizing 8,16 and some even32 GB. On a 64-bit Windows you can use either version. On a 32-bit Windows you should use only x86 obviously.
Maybe at some point you want to access dlls under Windows. In this case the architecture of Python must be the same, as the dll file.
If the dll file is a 32 bit library, you need 32 bit python.