Which version of Eclipse should I run on OSX? 32bit or 64bit?

Question

This may be a silly question but should I use the 32 bit or 64 bit version of Eclipse on my Mac?

I'm fully up to date with Snow Leopard and all patches and I have a pretty recent iMac (30", Dual Core, 3GB)

I thought that Java on Snow Leopard was now 64 bit only so can't understand why there is a 32bit download. Is it just the Eclipse download page that is showing 32 bit for older versions of OSX?

Answer 1

You're probably better off with the 64-bit edition. Nearly all the system software is 64-bit in Snow Leopard, and if you only run 64-bit apps, you don't pay the cost of having to load the 32-bit runtimes (which can consume quite a lot of memory). It may also benefit from the 64-bit memory model, though I'm not sure how well the JVM takes advantage of that yet. I expect the 32-bit version is provided for Leopard (and earlier) compatability.