With the amount of ram that you have in your system, getting a 64 bit OS is like buying a tuxedo for a pig. No offence meant towards pigs 8). Seriously getting a 64 bit version would be okay if (in the future) you upgraded your system with more ram.

In fact I'm confused about the version to get, there's so many different versions of windows 8 and prices...

Four is too many?

If you don't know which one is the right for you, the correct answer is Windows 8 (i.e. not "Windows 8 Pro") 64-bit.

Windows 8 - home and small office use.
Windows 8 Pro - usable in businesses that do not require much advanced features and by people that require something more than the usual version.
Windows 8 Enterprise - can't buy, only usable in big corporations.
Windows RT - ARM based, can't buy, you can only get it when buying a tablet / hybrid.

What's so confusing?

Fixed that for you.

You mean you broke it. o:p

True enough, but the point was that 32-bit and 64-bit share a key, so it doesn't really matter which one you get. I agree it makes more sense to get the 32-bit and later find a 64-bit disc if you need one, but buying a 64-bit one and getting a copy of 32-bit to install is a valid solution as well.

You didn't fix that at all. I wouldn't recommend buying the 32-bit edition to anyone who doesn't know what he's doing. If that's what you personally want, fine, but it's not something universally valid.

Why isn't 64bit an option for netbooks? I haven't seen any real netbooks sold in several years. AMD has 64bit processors that do just fine in that particular area of the market place.

And yes, 64 bit is the way to go, provided the OP has a computer that can handle it, which obviously he does otherwise it would be an incredibly stupid question to ask.
That's not quite correct. I know that Intel still produces some pretty old chips for specialty applications. But, you usually have to look for them. For instance the 80386SX was only discontinued in 2007.

Just to be clear, I was specifically talking about desktop/laptop machines (like the OP's machine), not e.g. old Atom-based netbooks or smartphones running Win7 Starter or something similar.

That said, I have two such ancient PCs at home in semi-active use, and they have no chance in heck running (32bit) Win8, or even Win7, in a meaningful way. Starting from the fact that the hardware vendors do not provide Win8 (or even Win7) drivers for the hw components that those machines possess. So trying to upgrade them to Win8/7 would be rather pointless. 64bit CPUs on desktop/laptop PCs have been the standard for... quite awhile.

As for what companies do... at least my employer has made clear which PCs can be upgraded to Win7, now that we are finally getting rid of XP on any PCs here (in favor of Win7). The PCs which can't(?) be upgraded to Win7 will be simply put out of use, and newer replacements with Win7 will be bought. For example, at least all the ancient ThinkPad T40-T43 machines which were not yet broken were marked as "can't run Win7", while my newer ThinkPad T400 was considered Win7 ready _after_ a BIOS upgrade (I don't know why that was deemed necessary for Win7, but anyways). And the T400 is running 64bit Win7.

And that is not because my employer has money to throw around, quite the opposite, as they've been trying to save money everywhere all the time (EU economy crisis and whatnot).

All in all, I'd say 32bit desktop/laptops versions of Win8 should be pretty much obsolete to this time and age.

Why would you suggest that? Except for running 16 bit applications, I can't think of anything that isn't better wtih a 64bit OS. You do lose a small amount of RAM do to the larger word size, but you gain the ability to run future applications that may very well be 64 bit only once people stop buying 32bit only OSes.

Using 64-bit version has some security benefits too. Major one which is quoted around the internet is that Kernel cannot be accessed by third party software. Also:
"Hardware-based DEP (Data Execution Protection), for example, is turned on for all 64-bit processes. Kernel Patch Protection (a.k.a. PatchGuard) protects access to internal operating system data structures. And device drivers must be digitally signed with a certificate issued by a trusted certificate authority. Finally, none of the large body of malware written as 32-bit drivers or any 16-bit code will run at all on 64-bit Windows."
source:http://securitywatch.pcmag.com/none/284281-is-64-bit-windows-safer-than-32-bit

And seeing that half of windows user base is already using 64-bit version, I see no reason "fight" back to the change.
Links:
http://blogs.windows.com/windows/b/bloggingwindows/archive/2010/07/08/64-bit-momentum-surges-with-windows-7.aspx
http://www.neogamr.net/news/windows-7-64-bit-now-used-by-majority-of-steam-owners

And like bazilisek said, Windows 8 64-bit looks to be replacement for "home premium" version. Those who wanna compare the different versions:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_8_editions

Thanks for clearing that out ;-)

My laptop came with 32-bit Vista but I've been using 32-bit Windows 8 Consumer and Release Previews since they came out. They're also 32-bit because that's what the Setup program gave me.
I'll install the 64-bit Release Preview next week to see how fast it is compared to the 32-bit version. If it runs fine, I'll get the 64-bit RTM version. :)