How unstable is 64x?

[Patient_Zero]

So, I want to try 64x to be able to use my pc's 12gigs of ram so I could run more mods. My internet isnt too great so i dont want to wait a few hours for 64x to download and then find out it was a waste of time.

[Wyseman76]

With linux your good to go, but in windows its very hit or miss. Many try it and leave it. If you can't get it to work for you or linux isn't and option, you can force OpenGL as it can save quite a bit of memory. It doesn't work for everyone but some have made it there option of choice.

[ferram4]

The win64 build was horribly unstable for 0.24. It has only become worse for 0.25, and it's beyond me why they released it in the first place. It crashes randomly, with no useful information being put in any of the logs. Memory usage above 4 Gb makes crashing almost inevitable, though it also occurs below that, at memory usage levels where win32 builds are perfectly stable. As a result of this instability, many mods simply refuse to run on win64 builds of KSP to ensure that all issues are attributed to win64 itself, not to any of those mods.

[Starman4308]

So, I want to try 64x to be able to use my pc's 12gigs of ram so I could run more mods. My internet isnt too great so i dont want to wait a few hours for 64x to download and then find out it was a waste of time.

Linux can be a bit wonky to set up: look at the Linux thread in the unmodded support forum to figure out how to get set up, particularly if you're using Steam.

Windows x64 is so unstable that many mod authors have entirely disabled their mods for it, because they are fed up supporting such an unstable build. The only way for you to get the mods to work for Windows x64 is, depending on the mod author, either ask them in a PM (acknowledging that they won't help you if it breaks), or to delete the check from the source code and recompile (again, expect no support).

[Boomerang]

It's fair to say that if it weren't for a multitude of people demanding an unfinished product, we wouldn't even have a Windows x64 release. That Squad themselves don't even recommend using it should say volumes.

[Raven.]

So, I want to try 64x to be able to use my pc's 12gigs of ram so I could run more mods. My internet isnt too great so i dont want to wait a few hours for 64x to download and then find out it was a waste of time.

Win64 is a mixed bag of nuts at best. Some people have had success, others not so much. To be honest with you, unless you know exactly what you're doing with mods, the source code behind mods, graphics drivers, how to switch between OpenGl, DX9, and DX11, and just plain ole' stubbornness, you probably don't need to be messing with 64 bit builds on KSP on Windows.

With that being said, I personally run Win64 KSP, and it is quite stable; I run KSP x64 with DirectX 11 enabled (DirectX11 is far more stable than the default DirectX9). However, I went way out of my way to ensure that stability, even to the point of opening up Visual Studio, modifying source code to several different mods, and re-compiling said plugins specifically for x64, and then figuring out what broke.

I can say, from experience, that I believe that a majority of the bugs with Win64 KSP is Unity's handling of DirectX 9. I say this, because KSPx64 with DirectX 9 crashes even you simply fart in the same room with it; Windows Vista runs better that KSPx64 with DirectX 9. KSPx64 with OpenGL is quite stable, although the performance with EnvironmentalVisualEnhancements is not great. KSPx64 with DirectX 11, however, is almost flawless with only minor, non-game breaking bugs. At least on my machine, which can greatly influence results.

Edited October 26, 2014 by Raven.

[merendel]

To describe the stability of win 64x first you must picture a ball.

Then balance a plank on that ball.

Have an elephant balance on the plank.

Build a house on the elephants back.

Have an earthquake going on for good measure.

See what happens to the house and you've got a prety good idea of KSP win 64x

If your runing windows your better off runing active texture management to keep the memory low. If your still haveing issues going over the mem cap you can try a few other options like forceing OpenGL mode. OpenGL can cause some issues for some people but for those it works the memory saveings are quite large.

[CalculusWarrior]

I'm using x64 and getting no more crashes than the 32-bit version. It's remarkably stable. That being said, others have said it is dependent on hardware, so I suppose I lucked out in terms of my setup.

[Virtualgenius]

When will squad move off DX9 its such a huge memory pig wouldnt the game be better moving to a more memory favorable and stable release like dx11 or opengl

[Specialist290]

The win64 build was horribly unstable for 0.24. It has only become worse for 0.25, and it's beyond me why they released it in the first place. It crashes randomly, with no useful information being put in any of the logs. Memory usage above 4 Gb makes crashing almost inevitable, though it also occurs below that, at memory usage levels where win32 builds are perfectly stable. As a result of this instability, many mods simply refuse to run on win64 builds of KSP to ensure that all issues are attributed to win64 itself, not to any of those mods.

While I can't say anything definitive on the part of the dev team since I'm not part of it myself, and my memory of the events is a bit hazy, a little forum archaeology might shed some light on the situation.

A while back, Unity 64-bit capability was quite the hot topic. As mentioned in many of those threads, Unity's 64-bit support was (and presumably still is, judging by the nature of the current topic) quite unstable, and thus Squad in all likelihood was reluctant to commit to what was (and possibly would remain for some time) an unstable and untested platform. Then some particularly bright spark managed to find a way to get it working on his own copy and encouraged others to do the same and share their findings. Again, while I can't speak on behalf of Squad's motives myself and this conclusion is as much speculation as anyone else's, I have this sneaking suspicion that, seeing the community's enthusiasm and knowing that you can't unring a bell once it's been rung, the developers decided that they might as well release what they had already worked on so that players wouldn't be restricted to having to jury-rig it up themselves. Thus, many users ended up, in this one instance, getting exactly what they had asked for... though whether this was what they wanted is, of course, an interesting matter to ponder

EDIT: And I've just been reminded by one of my peers that Squad did have a few words to say on the matter themselves as part of the FAQ to the 0.24 "First Contract" Update.

Edited October 26, 2014 by Specialist290

[ferram4]

There are times when you don't give people what they ask for because it will cause large problems, and win64 KSP builds were one of those situations.

I'll also note that Squad learned this lesson already. Experimentals used to be public, but the complaints and inaccurate bug reports resulted in them being made private. When the experimentals were closed they were more stable than the win64 build is currently, which makes this incredibly strange.

With that in mind, let me amend my statement slightly:

It's beyond me why they released it in the first place, when they've already dealt with the same exact situation by keeping the builds private.

[Technical Ben]

I'm using x64 and getting no more crashes than the 32-bit version. It's remarkably stable. That being said, others have said it is dependent on hardware, so I suppose I lucked out in terms of my setup.

Same here in 0.24. Not tried 0.25, but may migrate my saves today to give it a go.

The only bug I suffer from is the Unity no right click (unless I spam the button, gonna loose another mouse to that!) problem. I get the occasional crash on loading a new scene, but don't know if 32bit gets this as well?

[edit to avoid double post]

Also with the DX11 thing, I also only recently upgraded from a DX 10 card myself. I can understand people not wanting the game limited to DX 11.

Edited October 26, 2014 by Technical Ben

[Brody Peffley]

The bad part about that is not everyone has a dx 11 supported graphics card. I can only play games with dx 9 or dx10 since my card doesn't support dx 11. Also I play on a laptop so upgrading is not an option.

[SelectHalfling0]

I see alot on here about modded installs, what about unmodded ones? (I only use KAC, and I want to know if it is worth the risk)

[mythic_fci]

Linux: Very Stable

Windows: Very UNstable

I remember a user posting that KSP x64 got much more stable for him in the Windows 10 Preview, as well as a FPS boost of 8-10. Let's wait and see...

- - - Updated - - -

I see alot on here about modded installs, what about unmodded ones? (I only use KAC, and I want to know if it is worth the risk)

Probably, but watch out for major bugs.

[Mulbin]

I must be one of the , lucky ones. Runs perfectly straight out of the box for me, with a big stack of mods.

[Tail_TL]

64bit runs very stable and smooth for me, 10-15 Fps more than in 32bit so yeah. Not sure what people are experiencing and are telling you that its unstable.. For me it never crashed on me once.. never. It just runs smoother and overall is better by a long shot.. Except for the massive fact that the right click menu is bugged and it requires multiple clicks and punches to the right mouse button to open the part /or whatever UI. thats the game breaking deal for me. But that seriously is the only problem. And to give you a little bit more info, I'm running Windows 8.1 pro 64bit. It could also be possible that some people are having issues with it because they aren't on a 64bit OS, and probably never thought of it. I'm sure there are a lot of people who don't know anything thats related to 32 and 64bit.

Edited October 26, 2014 by Tail_TL

[ferram4]

There are people who aren't on a 64-bit OS at this point? Really?

All the problems appear to be pointer errors with addressing memory above the 32-bit limit, which implies a 64-bit pointer being coerced to 32-bit somewhere. Supposedly hardware affects this, but I'm not sure how hardware could cover up the errors that would result from truncating a 64-bit pointer.

[Raven.]

There are people who aren't on a 64-bit OS at this point? Really?

All the problems appear to be pointer errors with addressing memory above the 32-bit limit, which implies a 64-bit pointer being coerced to 32-bit somewhere. Supposedly hardware affects this, but I'm not sure how hardware could cover up the errors that would result from truncating a 64-bit pointer.

Yea, there some dinosaurs out there still running 32 bit OSes.

The truncating pointer issue makes perfect sense. In particular, I think it might be something with Unity and DX9.

I don't know if makes a difference or not, but I run a Xeon with ECC memory with a Radeon graphics card.

[Mulbin]

Expect for the massive fact that the right click menu is bugged and it requires multiple clicks and punches to the right mouse button to open the part /or whatever UI.

You can mostly fix this bug by going into your settings and changing "Max Physics Delta Time per Frame" to 0.05 sec

[gogozerg]

I wish the 64-bit version never existed.

Some many crashes (in space, everywhere... at a point, I couldn't build a rover anymore), bugs with clicks. Frustration. Had to stop playing (0.24.2).

Then I realized there was another version to try.

Edited October 26, 2014 by gogozerg

[merendel]

I see alot on here about modded installs, what about unmodded ones? (I only use KAC, and I want to know if it is worth the risk)

Unmodded or with very limited modding such as yourself there is not alot of drive to update to 64bit. Mods take up alot of ram and 32bit has a rather constraining upper limit on ram usage. Go over that limit and you'll crash 100% of the time. 64 bit raises that limit alowing more mods. If your runing only KAC you'll never even come close to the limit so the major draw of 64 bit is not there. There are a few potential benefits of runing 64 bit if everything goes perfect such as FCIsuperguy's FPS boost. However for the majority the instability is not worth marginal improvements and they wouldnt even risk it if they were not runing into the memory cap due to heavy modding.

[xtoro]

I always seem to post this, but, I highly recommend a Linux install for anyone wanting to run 64bit. It's rock solid, never crashes, and you can run as many mods as the physical memory in your computer will allow. You can also install it along side windows and have a dual boot system if you don't want to lose anything.

[magnemoe]

My main problem with 64 bit was problems with mods, guess it would work far better stock, however if you only play stock you have far less use for 64 bit.

[micha]

I always seem to post this, but, I highly recommend a Linux install for anyone wanting to run 64bit. It's rock solid, never crashes, and you can run as many mods as the physical memory in your computer will allow. You can also install it along side windows and have a dual boot system if you don't want to lose anything.

Yeah, same here.. but all I ever see is the Windows people whingeing about x64. First that they didn't have it, and now that it's buggy. When it's not even Squad's fault! Gah, people are frustrating!!

Hopefully the next version of Unity is not too far away, and fixes x64 for all platforms. In the meantime it's strangely satisfying to see Linux shine in an area which is usually dominated by Windows.

As yet another alternative, it's dead easy to setup a USB stick with Linux & KSP on it - no need to even touch your precious hard drive. A 4GB stick should be enough, 8GB is definitely enough.