Compatibility: Vista 64 vs. Vista 32

[Scotter]

I'm about to build a new computer.
All the parts will be here by tomorrow.
Also bought Vista Ultimate 64-bit.

Does that OS have a compatibility mode for 32-bit software? Or do I need to
run 64-bit versions of everything? Will using the 64-bit version of Vista
severely limit what software I can use? Here are some of the programs I can
think of now:

MS Office 2003
MS Visual Studio 2005
FTP Voyager
Boxer Text Editor
Nero
Photoshop CS2
Illustrator CS2
Acrobat
Flash 8
Poser 7
Game: Supreme Commander
Game: Planetside
iTunes
Fraps

Oh and I suppose I'll switch from Outlook to the mail program built into
Vista... ? Anything you all want to share about that? For one, does that
mail program have a built-in spam-checker? If so, how effective have you all
found it to be? If it doesn't, is there a 3rd-party spam-checker that works
with the 64-bit Vista mail program?

Thanks for any info/advice you can give! (I'm going to do a lot of Googling
now to see what I can learn while I hope for response to this post)

 

[Andyistic]

You can run all 32-bit Windows software (which work under Vista 32) under
Vista 64, except device drivers.
All drivers must be 64-bit and must be signed.
Before you feel that your device can't be used because it doesn't have such
a driver on the installation disk,
check with the manufacturer's website. They are updating drivers all the
time.

My pen tablet works fine from XP out of the box.
Won't work at all under Vista until I went to their webpage and installed
their Vista driver.
What I got from them on the webpage also works for Vista 64.

-- Andy