[SOLVED] Folder Program Files

What is the significance of Folder Program Files (x86)?

What belongs there and not in Program Files?

You have a 64-bit installation of Windows. Applications that are not 64-bit go to the (x86) folder, while 64-bit applications go to "Program Files."

Many thanks for that. X86 seems to be a very ill-chosen designation.

The seller of my new computers seems to have distributed programs arbitrarily. Some are present in both folders, on both machines. All seem to function properly. Should I redistribute them - and change a host of shortcuts?

How can I tell which are 64-bit programs?

The 64bit programs will be in the Programs folder. 32 bit will be put in the Programs (x86) folder. You then get things like Photoshop which will go in both. If, like me, you have Photoshop plugins that are only 32bit compatible, you have to force Photoshop to only use the 32bit install.

X86 isn't an ill-chosen designation. X86 is the name of the instruction set that the world's 32-bit processors run on. An instruction set is the lowest possible level of a processor, which truly defines how a CPU is supposed to work.

Think of it as DNA. No matter how wildly different one cell is from another, they are ultimately governed by DNA at their lowest level. So it goes with CPUs, and it has been that way for 30 years or more.

Today's 64-bit processors extend the x86 instruction set with a group of instructions called x86-64. AMD invented that technology for their Athlon 64 processors, and Intel later licensed it for the Core 2 Duo. Intel calls their implementation EMT64.

Now, as for Windows, it organizes applications by x86 ("Program Files (x86)") and x86-64 ("Program Files") because that is the most efficient way to do things. Logical categorization works for people, and it works for PCs, too. Don't try to reorder anything.

But x86 goes farther back than 32-bit. Thus poorly chosen.

I have some programs in both folders, which doesn't make much sense. How to decide where individual programs belong? Windows by itself, doesn't seem to organize anything at all!

I also have 16-bit programs, created under Windows 3.11, that run on 32-bit systems,.but not on 64-bit. Innovation as seen by Microsoft, I guess!

x86 does go back farther than 32-bit, but that is immaterial, as the x86 ISA 32-bit instruction set. Calling it "Program Files (x86)" is indeed one of a few proper names to call 32-bit applications.

Programs install in both folders as their binaries dictate: some applications use a mixture of 32-bit and 64-bit files, which is why they go into both folders.

And finally, 16-bit applications don't run on 64-bit because 64-bit OSes have no way to address 16-bit applications. This is true of Linux, MacOS and Windows. It's not a Microsoft thing.

Thanks again. The assumption then, is that the install-programs decide where to place various routines? And that Windows treats them differently, depending on the folder from which they are fetched?

That is exactly right.

OK. Many thanks. Where would one learn all of that without a support forum? Certainly not from the Windows Help facility. Anyone who knew what to search for in Help, would need no help!