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Topic: foobar going 64bit? (Read 21610 times) previous topic - next topic
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foobar going 64bit?

A simple question regarding development path:
Is foobar going to become 64 bit app in near future? There would be one advantage of such move - bigger memory usage, which could allow for speeding up for example ML search functionalities for very large libraries. But of course there are those side effects, like causing all current plugins being incompatible / requiring recompiling/additional development.

So is something like this considered or no? I am just curious, nothing more.

Re: foobar going 64bit?

Reply #1
Good question, I'm curious about that too although I don't have my hopes up.

Re: foobar going 64bit?

Reply #2
It can't become 64-bit while still supporting WinXP, and

foobar2000 still supports Windows versions as old as Windows XP - and that's not expected to change this decade

BTW, I will miss foo_jesus and foo_chacon.

Re: foobar going 64bit?

Reply #3
This was actually done as early as 2005 with 0.9 alpha series on Windows XP 64-bit but there were no interesting benefits beyond the potential ability to index larger libraries / load larger playlists - but the performance would still suck due to loading on startup and saving on shutdown.

The main problem with 64-bit build is that no existing component will work. Maintaining separate 64-bit and 32-bit builds of every single component would have created a huge mess, that's why I abandoned the idea.

There are other options for improving large media library search performance at cost of component compatibility, for an example replacing the ancient metadb design with a modern SQLite backend - which would solve slow search, slow startup, slow shutdown and large memory usage.

That said, every flavour of foobar2000 mobile does have a 64-bit compile available and even the experimental Mac version is 64-bit.
Microsoft Windows: We can't script here, this is bat country.

Re: foobar going 64bit?

Reply #4
Loving the sqlite idea. I'm doing that already using an ancient wsh script but it's more to store data and display graphs and not for searching. I often wondered why foobar doesn't go the more true database route.

Re: foobar going 64bit?

Reply #5
Basically I can't redesign foobar2000 database without making existing components not work - the metadb interface presented to components has very strong ties to the existing database design.

foobar2000 mobile - and foobar2000 for Mac prototype - already all use SQLite.
Microsoft Windows: We can't script here, this is bat country.

Re: foobar going 64bit?

Reply #6
Thanks for answers :)

Re: foobar going 64bit?

Reply #7
Hi, why not making Windows Store foobar 64bit, addons are not working there anyway, even if it would some day.

BTW: When is Store version updated to Beta 12?

Re: foobar going 64bit?

Reply #8
+1 for a 64bit build.

In my case i use some VST plugins wich unfortunately (or fortunately?) are starting to drop x86 version support.

I already have the new version of my beloved IRCAM Hear v3 that doesn't support x86 anymore :(

Re: foobar going 64bit?

Reply #9
That is not necessary for VST plugin support. My foo_midi component, for instance, already supports 64 bit VST instruments, since they are loaded out of process anyway.

Re: foobar going 64bit?

Reply #10
[long time...] I just bought a new Windows 10 Pro x64 PC. [Of course, almost all PCs are 64-bit now?] If I don't hear back here, I'll try starting a new thread.

Re: foobar going 64bit?

Reply #11
In my very humble opinion there will only be a 64 bit version of foobar2000 when Windows is going to force it by dropping support for 32 bit apps.

Re: foobar going 64bit?

Reply #12
all the game music Components I use written by Kode54... he is a great programmer so I have no doubt he could rewrite them for 64bit some day... lol ;) ^_^ :D

and I too would like to see a native build for 64bit Windows 7+ lol
if possible... its just installing the new version in such a way as to import existing settings files and DB files.. as I save the settings and db files and playlist internally to the Foobar2000 program folder...

Re: foobar going 64bit?

Reply #13
That is not necessary for VST plugin support. My foo_midi component, for instance, already supports 64 bit VST instruments, since they are loaded out of process anyway.
That makes perfect sense.

Unfortunately there are no news on the internal vst wrapper for 64bit VST support.
 

Re: foobar going 64bit?

Reply #14
A prototype of 64bit version could be a try.
It does not need to be compatible with all extensions, just integrated components only is fine for now. Some audio formats which need external decoders (such as .ape, .tak, .tta) can be just fed to ffmpeg and it can deal with them.

Re: foobar going 64bit?

Reply #15
Going ARM serves about as much purpose, and breaks just as much. Also not likely to ever happen.

Re: foobar going 64bit?

Reply #16
It's really sad seeing this (again) knowing that foobar will "probably" never see any significant performance gains because of old outdated and some probably unmaintained components. As my music collection keeps ever growing, foobar degraded performance does too. That SQLite backend stuff would be like a dream come true.

Re: foobar going 64bit?

Reply #17
I'm very happy with the performance of Foobar2000 and the components I use. I'm just concerned that someday 32-bit support in Windows might be deprecated, and I'll have to make due without components I've come to rely on.

My opinion doesn't count for much, but I think the earlier a 64-bit version is available, the earlier people can start supporting it with good components. Start too late and you'll miss the opportunity to get some component developers on board.
Think millionaire, but with cannons.

Re: foobar going 64bit?

Reply #18
I'm just concerned that someday 32-bit support in Windows might be deprecated, and I'll have to make due without components I've come to rely on.
You don't have to worry about it. This won't happen in the near future.
Windows is hell-bent on backward-compatibility and the amount of still-in-use 32bit-only applications is staggering (heck, even MSI binary is 32bit-only).
Windows is not MacOS =)

Re: foobar going 64bit?

Reply #19
Windows is hell-bent on backward-compatibility

Yeah, I mean ...
* Jumping from Windows 8 to Windows 10 in order not to break software that would identify Windows 95 and 98 by "Windows 9"
* Micros~1 - the 8.3 filenames.
* "Long" pathnames are still an issue because they dare not change that constant. Trying to move stuff with Windows Explorer, and Windows will rather have you lose files than allowing long names. (But if you are lucky you can use the 8.3 ...)

... oh but we all got fsck'd when Microsoft deprecated drive names like "]:", didn't we?

Re: foobar going 64bit?

Reply #20
So, how about starting a 64 bit *nix version in co-development? maybe open-source?
Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?  ;~)


Re: foobar going 64bit?

Reply #22
@kode54 , @Peter,
do you think it would  be possible to add the following questions to the FAQ? Since they are being asked regularly and they always result in long threads of same arguments being made over and over again...

- Why is there no 64-bit foobar2000?
- Why is there no native dark theme?
- Why is there no Linux-native foobar2000?
- Why is foobar2000 not open-source?

I can even grep some replies with quotes from this board if you want :D


Re: foobar going 64bit?

Reply #24
Hello friends. Everything is going to ARM64. I do not know what will happen to foobar, which does not even support x64 natively. how do you run foobar on Apple M1?