32 Bit OS HELP

[nymph4]

If you have a 32 Bit CPU I know that it just meens it can process 32 Bits at a time.

But should you be running a 32 Bit Operating System or is that not how this works?
I did not unerstand what a 32 Bit Operating System was and what a 16 Bit Operating System was??

[Spoiler]

Here you go....

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/32-bit

A little reading...

[nymph4]

Ok I do know that if a CPU is 32 Bits that means it needs 32 Bits to run and it Process 32 Bits.

But what I read just talks about Data BUSS Width and Internal Registers Width and that is what gets me mixt up.

So am I to understand that if an Operating System is 32 Bits that the CPU must be 32 Bit Processor so it can talk to the Operating System?

[Carbon Dudeoxide]

I found this article to do with 32bit and 64bit.

By using 32 bits your processor can represent numbers from 0 to 4,294,967,295 while a 64-bit machine can represent numbers from 0 to 18,446,744,073,709,551,615. Obviously this means your computer can do math with larger numbers, and be more efficient with smaller numbers.

Link