DNV GL Phast8.4_ Safeti 8.4

This version of Phast/Safeti is based on 64-bit architecture, which brings significant performance benefits
for memory management.
One of the limitations of 32-bit software is that a single process can access up to 4 GB of RAM only. This
means that if you have 8 GB of RAM on your PC, a single Phast/Safeti process can access only half of it.
That’s not to say having 8 GB (or more) of RAM isn’t useful, because in Phast/Safeti calculations can be
run in parallel, meaning more than 4GB of RAM is being consumed across those parallel processes.
However, there are still limitations, because each individual process has access to 4 GB at most.
This limitation with 32-bit technology can cause problems in Phast/Safeti, particularly for large studies,
due to the extensive calculations being performed. Users may have seen the software ‘crash’ due to the
4 GB limit being reached. There are workarounds, such as dividing the study into multiple files and
running them separately. However, such workarounds are cumbersome.
As such, a decision was made to make version 8.4 of Phast/Safeti a 64-bit product. We have done
significant testing on very large studies and we’re seeing significant performance benefit.
Please note that our recommended PC specifications in the installation notes have been updated.
Also note that a side-effect of the 64-bit work is the GIS taking slightly longer to load than in previous
versions. This is due to the way that the GIS has had to be implemented in the 64-bit version