Major Cooke wrote: I know a few folks who claim the 32 bit version runs faster than the 64 bit, on their 64x operating system. Their words, not mine.
Yes, I had that problem, too, when my 64 bit system was new. Eventually the drivers managed to make 64 bit just as fast as 32 bit.
So I think I know where the problem is...

It should take no rocket science, that those "32 bit is faster than 64 bit people" ultimately won't be any deterrence if at some future point in time 32 bit support will be removed. It's by no means on the short term roadmap but by now I already treat 32 bit as an afterthought only. All development takes place in 64 bit and gets optimized for 64 bit. I have already seen how much slower both the software renderer and the VM are with so much less CPU registers available, and that's probably going to get worse over time.