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What happened to 64-bit KSP?

kithylin

By kithylin
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kithylin

kithylin

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I was under the assumption that with the recent update to KSP, the only version possible to play is 64-bit now.... So I went and haven't played it for like 5 days. Come back today, there's an update and when I start up there's a prompt to start it in 64-bit or "play KSP"... what gives?

 

I'll launch it in 64-bit I guess but When did we get 32-bit back? Did they revert something recently?

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kithylin

kithylin

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1 hour ago, 5thHorseman said:

64 bit was never the only way to play. It was the defaut for a while but they switched it back. No known reason, and as far as I know Squad hasn't said anything about it.

To answer the title, though, "What happened to 64-bit KSP?", it's still there. :)

That was it, it was the default the last time I played and now it's not so it sort of threw me off and I wondered what else they changed now.

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eddiew

eddiew

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I imagine it was switched back due to some Steam statistic somewhere saying a significant proportion of players only have a 32 bit OS. 

It would be nice if it auto-detected and ran the right one for you though.

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Padishar

Padishar

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2 minutes ago, eddiew said:

It would be nice if it auto-detected and ran the right one for you though.

On 32bit Windows, Steam only downloads the 32bit version, so it's even more of a mystery why it doesn't automatically run the 64bit when it's available.  I never actually launch from Steam so it doesn't bother me in the slightest but I guess, if I did, I would like to be able to configure which version it runs when you launch the game, rather than having to right-click and choose it from a menu to be sure...

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klgraham1013

klgraham1013

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26 minutes ago, eddiew said:

I imagine it was switched back due to some Steam statistic somewhere saying a significant proportion of players only have a 32 bit OS. 

It would be nice if it auto-detected and ran the right one for you though.

That significant portion is under 5% if I remember correctly.  The breakdown was in another thread.

Edited by klgraham1013
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Kerbart

Kerbart

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32 minutes ago, Draco T stand-up guy said:

Why is the option even available?

I, for one, have a 64 bit OS on a 64 bit PC on which I want to play a 64bit game and it's not as if they can't find out that info from the system itself.

Back in the day when the first attempt for an official 64 bit version was made, I was pretty happy that there was a choice. Given that in Windows, the 64 bit version of Unity 4 was horribly unstable. Those that wanted to try it out could, those that desired more stability (and less mods), did not have to.

Imagine the landing-leg issue was 64-bit related; it would be annoying if you were forced to play the 64 bit version if the 32 bit version would fix things.

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Padishar

Padishar

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8 minutes ago, klgraham1013 said:

That significant portion is under 5% if I remember correctly.  The breakdown was in another thread.

I think it was more like 10% but even if only 5%, that still makes it a considerable number of users for a product that has sold well over a million copies, representing a significant amount of money.  It would also be seen as a pretty dodgy thing to do if they removed the 32bit version now, all the people on 32bit who have already bought it would be denied the upgrade.

The main thing that has to be remembered is that there is actually very little point in running the 64bit version unless you are modding the game fairly heavily.  If you are modding the game (at all, let alone heavily) then it is highly recommended that you create a copy of the entire KSP install outside of Steam and mod that so that you don't get nasty problems if/when Steam decides to update your game, potentially breaking mods and possibly corrupting saves due to non-functional mods.

In some situations the 64bit version is slightly faster than the 32bit version and it is much less likely to crash due to running out of memory but the stock game in 32bit can and does still provide a lot of entertainment for a lot of people.

As I implied above, the fact that people still use 32bit Windows and hence need the 32bit version has no bearing on which version Steam decides to run on 64bit Windows.  Steam knows you are on 64bit (it doesn't download the 64bit version on 32bit Windows) so it could very easily (as is obvious from the various different implementations we have seen in the last week) launch the 64bit one by default or give you an option to choose...

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Raideur Ng

Raideur Ng

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If you're using the store installer, the it DOES install both versions, and the launcher allows the option for 64 bit. HOWEVER, the icon it puts on your desktop targets KSP.exe, not KSP_x64.exe. Going into the properties of the icon and changing that ensures it launches 64 bit. A bug topic was made but it's very low priority.

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Draco T stand-up guy

Draco T stand-up guy

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2 hours ago, Kerbart said:

Back in the day when the first attempt for an official 64 bit version was made, I was pretty happy that there was a choice. Given that in Windows, the 64 bit version of Unity 4 was horribly unstable. Those that wanted to try it out could, those that desired more stability (and less mods), did not have to.

Imagine the landing-leg issue was 64-bit related; it would be annoying if you were forced to play the 64 bit version if the 32 bit version would fix things.

It's not back in the day any more and we have a stable, high performance 64bit version.

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Karyn451

Karyn451

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Thanks Fourfa,  I'll have a look later (currently at work...)

So a related question....  in the Win version of Launcher in the Settings panel you can set which version (64 or 32) to run.  In the OSX Launcher ALL the options on that page are marked "Not available" ...   so how would I force it to run x64 in OSX?  (assuming it isn't...) 

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Kerbart

Kerbart

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58 minutes ago, Draco T stand-up guy said:

It's not back in the day any more and we have a stable, high performance 64bit version.

And is there a guarantee that each release is stable? The world of software development is full of good intentions, but that doesn't mean the software is automatically bug free. In fact, not everyone will agree with you that the Windows 64 bit release is more stable and performs better. For most of us it does, but there are exceptions. Should those users be stuck with slower, more crash-prone software when they could have had the chance to get a better experience?

40 minutes ago, klgraham1013 said:

Would you rather inconvenience 90% of your consumers, or 10%? 

Not all inconvenience is equal. There's the “A dialog! Oh! The humanity!” inconvenience and there's the “Oops! The Game Crashed” inconvenience. Personally, if the choice is between giving 90% of the users the first inconvenience or 200,000 paying customers the second “inconvenience” then I'd go rather for the first one.

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Pecan

Pecan

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4 hours ago, Draco T stand-up guy said:

Why is the option even available?

I, for one, have a 64 bit OS on a 64 bit PC on which I want to play a 64bit game and it's not as if they can't find out that info from the system itself.

Whereas I want to use 64-bit I also want to share the things I make and write with as many people as possible.  For that reason I also run the 32-bit version to ensure compatibility.
Remember the fuss there was about mods that weren't supported on 64-bit because the developers got so much hassle about (Unity/KSP) issues outside their control.  Imagine if mod-developers using 64-bit were unable to check if there was any problem - such as memory - using their mods on 32-bit.

Choice is good.  Lowest Common Denominator testing is good.  Why wouldn't there be an option?

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Padishar

Padishar

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1 hour ago, klgraham1013 said:

Would you rather inconvenience 90% of your consumers, or 10%? 

  1. Discontinuing the 32bit build would do more than inconvenience those users who run 32bit Windows.
  2. The current state doesn't significantly inconvenience anyone, let alone 90%, most users don't need to run the 64bit version and it isn't that much of an annoyance to have to right click and select the 64bit version explicitly.
  3. I'd rather they simply added an option to let you select which one to launch, then everybody can be happy...
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fourfa

fourfa

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14 hours ago, fourfa said:

It's a bit obscure in OSX. Try opening Activity Monitor while KSP is running, go to the memory tab, and Type should be listed as 64

Correction: go to the Disk tab in Activity Monitor.  Under Kind, should say 64 bit

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AlamoVampire

AlamoVampire

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19 hours ago, eddiew said:

That is odd then... I just launch from a desktop shortcut now, but I miss having my hours counted :blush:

I got ksp about 3 days after .21 dropped and landed on steam. I run from the x64 shortcut but used to run from the x32 shortcut before 1.1. Steam counts the hours for me and im sure as i can be it will for you :)

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