identifying 64-bit Windows from 2.3.5?

[Peter Hansen]

Steven Knight wrote:
> ... the same Python executable and code works just fine on both systems,
> but I need to do different things (in this case, invoke a different
> compiler with a different set of compiler options) based on whether or
> not I'm building on a 32-bit or 64-bit system.

Would a test for the presence of the 64-bit version of the compiler (or 
better yet, an attempt to execute it, then a fallback to the other if it 
fails) not work adequately?

Or, failing that, does sys.maxint return something different on the 
64-bit system?

-Peter