but you need a special itanium processor right? it wont run on my rig

Well, in Intels case, you need one of thier processors that use EM64T (this is thier fancy way of saying 64bit)

God knows what AMD call it.

so my intel processor will support it right?

Well if there's a way round this then I'd love to know it. I've been asked this a number of times over the last few years (mainly as folks discover they require more memory) and have not found a way around it yet.

Except to go 64bit.

our cpu SHOULD support it, all the prescotts and above do, even if the prescotts do emulate 64bit, i think im going to get a 64bit vista, the place i bought my copy has a very good returns policy, and all the core 2s have 64bit chips, but im not too sure wether the core duos do, or if its just emulation like the p4s. and please feel free to correct me on the emulation thing if im wrong, this is just what i read

EDIT: did a little searching for you, and all the dual core cpus from intel support 64bit, and for the ease when trying to find this info, could you please place your cpu model number in your specs, eg. mine is an e4400, this will be a lot more helpful than if i put "2ghz core 2 duo" or do what i did and put both