Unlike modern SQL Server versions that support the ubiquitous x86-64 (AMD64/Intel 64) architecture, the native 64-bit version of SQL Server 2000 was built exclusively for the processor family.
MS SQL Server 2000 Developer Edition 64-Bit: A Technical Retro-Review
It did not support consumer OSs like Windows XP 64-bit Edition effectively without significant workarounds. 4. System Requirements (Minimum) Requirement Processor Intel Itanium or Itanium 2 Operating System ms sql server 2000 developer edition 64 bit
The 64-bit Developer Edition was functionally identical to the Enterprise Edition but restricted by its license for development and testing use only.
It required a 64-bit version of the Windows Server 2003 family. Unlike modern SQL Server versions that support the
Because it was a first-generation 64-bit product, it had several unique constraints:
It could not run natively on modern x86-64 processors (Intel Core/Xeon or AMD Ryzen/EPYC). For those systems, users had to wait for the release of SQL Server 2005. For those systems, users had to wait for
The installation included the 64-bit relational database engine, SQL Agent, and 64-bit Analysis Services. 3. Notable Limitations and "Gotchas"
Even in the 64-bit edition, many management tools (like Enterprise Manager) remained 32-bit applications.
It leveraged the Itanium's parallel processing capabilities to speed up complex data warehousing and analytics queries.