so what your saying is that if you are having no problems with cpu power, you can run plugins with no skipping or popping, and you can play back your 37 track mix with no problems, then you don't need to go into the 64 bit real?
Well, under any test Ive seen so far, the 64 bit OS will require more power than the 32 bit one. Vista64 adds a HUGE overhead in terms of resources needed just to be at the same performance level as winxpsp1 32bit.
Theres a lot of hype that the 64 bit OS is faster than 32, but every audio benchmark Ive ever seen has shown the opposite, even in apps specifically made for 64 bit OS.
So, you definitely wouldnt want to go to 64 bit if you are wanting more power...what it can give you is the ability to access more ram. Not something you are concerned with since Vegas doesnt do VST-i's.
Now the above is dealing with OS bits, not audio processing/storage bits
what about summing, will the 64bit render a better stereo mix than the 32
Given the same mix, constrained to the same output bitdepth, and staying out of internal clipping, a 64 bit float audio engine and a 32 bit float audio engine SHOULD null to around -150db or more with each other, which is lower than the ability of any real world converters to playback an audible difference.
Now, this is all in theory...practice can be different, but I have spent a LOT of time rendering files in different apps to test, and its pretty much garbage in, garbage out. Lots of people will tell you there is some magic summing sauce in one app or another, but the tests dont bear that out, and indeed they cant even give a plausible guess to what the difference mechanism could possibly be.
sorry if i sound like a newbie, I've been recording long enough (started with a tascam 4 trk) to understand mic placement, recording techniques, mixing, and gain setting, but i bought my first computer when i went digital. so i under stand the concept of a daw, but not the actual computer it's self.
I think its fair to say that I left Vegas, for a somewhat Vegas inspired 64 bit float app, but I did NOT do it for the extra 32 bits...
As long as you are making sensible level practices, you will be fine the way you are. Don't do what most sites and magazine ads tell you (where they say run as hot as you can without clipping), just like in the analog world, find where "zero VU" is on your converters and aim for that, not 0dBFS and you should be OK.
