About 64-bit And It's Problems

Interesting theory, and probably you are correct. Would that account for a default vanilla install though, without any extra apps added? Because thats what mine was.. 'out of the box' it was dog slow. If this is true, I have to wonder why those particular (DLLs ? hehe j/k) shared libraries are still in 32 bit?
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There are both 64-bit and 32-bit versions of the libraries, the appropriate one is used by the app. The point is that both sets are loaded if you are running 64 and 32 bit apps.

If you have insufficient RAM for the desktop you have chosen, then the machine will be slow. Sufficient for KDE seems to be around 512MB min.

OK fair enough. I am using Gnome, which I guess either uses more shared libs or requires more RAM. Either way, im happy with my "32 on 64" configuration and expect to keep it this way for a while

There are some programs that are notably faster on 64-bit. Blender is one of them. These programs were painstakingly optimized for a 64-bit environment. Most of the other programs were ported, for lack of a better term. The code had to be changed internally (switching to -long code) and as a result, it takes longer to compile and longer to load.

Give it time. Eventually a 64-bit "native" edition will be available, optimized to use the 64-bit architecture to its full capacity. For now, I am satisfied with the 20% speed increase a 64-bit processor has over its 32-bit counterparts when running 32-bit code.

~~ Andrew D.