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This is outdated now; please see Ben's answer.

The World of Warcraft client is a 32-bit program. As such, running it in a 64-bit OS provides no benefit except possibly extra available memory. In fact it may be slower on a 64-bit OS; Windows 7's WOW layer, which essentially translates between 32 and 64 bits, is naturally slower than native 32-bit Windows 7.

As for the memory, a 32-bit OS generally only allows for 3-4 GB (see info for Windows). This should be enough for WoW and the rest of the system, depending on what you have running in the background. If you want a lot of other apps using memory, then you should probably go 64-bit with more than 4 GB RAM.

Again, I can't see this being a problem. The hardware requirements for Wow: Cataclysm state that only 2 GB of total memory is required, so having 4 GB in the system should be plenty.

That all said, if you're building a new computer this shouldn't be an issue at all. WoW should run great if you have a good enough graphics card to support the resolution and maxed options. In that case I would go with 64-bit myself, since there will be more and more software that takes advantage of it (and you might want to play crazier games that need more memory than WoW does).

This is outdated now; please see Ben's answer.

The World of Warcraft client is a 32-bit program. As such, running it in a 64-bit OS provides no benefit except possibly extra available memory. In fact it may be slower on a 64-bit OS; Windows 7's WOW layer, which essentially translates between 32 and 64 bits, is naturally slower than native 32-bit Windows 7.

As for the memory, a 32-bit OS generally only allows for 3-4 GB (see info for Windows). This should be enough for WoW and the rest of the system, depending on what you have running in the background. If you want a lot of other apps using memory, then you should probably go 64-bit with more than 4 GB RAM.

Again, I can't see this being a problem. The hardware requirements for Wow: Cataclysm state that only 2 GB of total memory is required, so having 4 GB in the system should be plenty.

That all said, if you're building a new computer this shouldn't be an issue at all. WoW should run great if you have a good enough graphics card to support the resolution and maxed options. In that case I would go with 64-bit myself, since there will be more and more software that takes advantage of it (and you might want to play crazier games that need more memory than WoW does).

The World of Warcraft client is a 32-bit program. As such, running it in a 64-bit OS provides no benefit except possibly extra available memory. In fact it may be slower on a 64-bit OS; Windows 7's WOW layer, which essentially translates between 32 and 64 bits, is naturally slower than native 32-bit Windows 7.

As for the memory, a 32-bit OS generally only allows for 3-4 GB (see info for Windows). This should be enough for WoW and the rest of the system, depending on what you have running in the background. If you want a lot of other apps using memory, then you should probably go 64-bit with more than 4 GB RAM.

Again, I can't see this being a problem. The hardware requirements for Wow: Cataclysm state that only 2 GB of total memory is required, so having 4 GB in the system should be plenty.

That all said, if you're building a new computer this shouldn't be an issue at all. WoW should run great if you have a good enough graphics card to support the resolution and maxed options. In that case I would go with 64-bit myself, since there will be more and more software that takes advantage of it (and you might want to play crazier games that need more memory than WoW does).

This is outdated now; please see Ben's answer.

The World of Warcraft client is a 32-bit program. As such, running it in a 64-bit OS provides no benefit except possibly extra available memory. In fact it may be slower on a 64-bit OS; Windows 7's WOW layer, which essentially translates between 32 and 64 bits, is naturally slower than native 32-bit Windows 7.

As for the memory, a 32-bit OS generally only allows for 3-4 GB (see info for Windows). This should be enough for WoW and the rest of the system, depending on what you have running in the background. If you want a lot of other apps using memory, then you should probably go 64-bit with more than 4 GB RAM.

Again, I can't see this being a problem. The hardware requirements for Wow: Cataclysm state that only 2 GB of total memory is required, so having 4 GB in the system should be plenty.

That all said, if you're building a new computer this shouldn't be an issue at all. WoW should run great if you have a good enough graphics card to support the resolution and maxed options. In that case I would go with 64-bit myself, since there will be more and more software that takes advantage of it (and you might want to play crazier games that need more memory than WoW does).

The World of Warcraft client is a 32-bit program. As such, running it in a 64-bit OS provides no benefit except possibly extra available memory. In fact it may be slower on a 64-bit OS; Windows 7's WOW layer, which essentially translates between 32 and 64 bits, is naturally slower than native 32-bit Windows 7.

As for the memory, a 32-bit OS generally only allows for 3-4 GB (see info for Windows). This should be enough for WoW and the rest of the system, depending on what you have running in the background. If you want a lot of other apps using memory, then you should probably go 64-bit with more than 4 GB RAM.

Again, I can't see this being a problem. The hardware requirements for Wow: Cataclysm state that only 2 GB of total memory is required, so having 4 GB in the system should be plenty.

The World of Warcraft client is a 32-bit program. As such, running it in a 64-bit OS provides no benefit except possibly extra available memory. In fact it may be slower on a 64-bit OS; Windows 7's WOW layer, which essentially translates between 32 and 64 bits, is naturally slower than native 32-bit Windows 7.

As for the memory, a 32-bit OS generally only allows for 3-4 GB (see info for Windows). This should be enough for WoW and the rest of the system, depending on what you have running in the background. If you want a lot of other apps using memory, then you should probably go 64-bit with more than 4 GB RAM.

Again, I can't see this being a problem. The hardware requirements for Wow: Cataclysm state that only 2 GB of total memory is required, so having 4 GB in the system should be plenty.

That all said, if you're building a new computer this shouldn't be an issue at all. WoW should run great if you have a good enough graphics card to support the resolution and maxed options. In that case I would go with 64-bit myself, since there will be more and more software that takes advantage of it (and you might want to play crazier games that need more memory than WoW does).