Why does rand () on 64 bit RHEL 5 gives different result?

Issue

• rand () in RHEL 6 and RHEL 5 64 bit produces different results.

• For following code

#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
int main ()
{
  unsigned int nSeed = 2147483648; // or any number bigger than this 
  printf ("Seed: %d\n", nSeed);
  srand (nSeed);
  printf ("Random number: %d\n", rand());

  return 0;
}

• On RHEL5 and RHEL6 the above gives different results for the random number.

RHEL6 32 and 64 bit: 
Seed: -2147483648
Random number: 1336741213


RHEL5 32 bit: 
Seed: -2147483648
Random number: 1336741213

RHEL5 64 bit:
Seed: -2147483648
Random number: 722473798

• If the seed is < 2^31, then they produced the same result.