Hi, my name is Barry Schader. I'm in the process of building
a very small 'data warehouse' (3GB, but growing) using Oracle
on an Alpha workstation (233MHz) running NT 3.51, which is
very quickly running out of steam. I didn't expect to run into
CPU limitations this soon! And struggling without a decent
batch control language is terrible (going to try Hamilton C Shell).
This thread is very interesting -- thanks for all of the input!
Everything I've read here and elsewhere points in the direction
of UNIX. And it sounds like an Intel box is going to be pretty
limiting for me later on. However, I have these problems:
- Cost of hardware. Compaq Intel box w/2 PPro 200, 256MB memory,
UltraSCSI, 3x9GB disks is around $25,000. AlphaServer 4100
with single 400MHz CPU, 512MB, F/W SCSI, one 4GB disk is
around $60,000 (but admittedly offers much room for growth). Our
Alpha salesman says that he's seen their I/O subsystem run
9 times faster than an Ultra-SCSI based system on an Intel SMP
box. (?!)
- Cost of Oracle. NT/Intel is the 'Workgroup' level server, which is
ONE FIFTH the cost per user (and 2.5 times cheaper on annual
support -- thanks Microsoft SQL-Server!), about $300 per user,
vs. $1500 for the 'Enterprise' level. Although NT on a single CPU
Alpha is also 'Workgroup', they stick you in the 'Enterprise' as
soon as you stick in the second CPU -- OUCH. Unix is
'Enterprise' level on any platform. According to Oracle, 'Workgroup'
is the same engine as 'Enterprise', minus some options like
Parrallel Query (admittedly could be very handy in my case).
- Lack of UNIX expertise. We are a VMS shop, but starting to pull
away from VMS (although we dearly love the OS). A few years
down the line, we'd like to be on one or at most two OS's, if at all
possible. Compared to VMS, UNIX and NT both seem a bit weak.
NT seems to have a more 'advanced' foundation to build on (we
like the VMS heritage). Our one guy who has attempted to support
an HP/UX system has been disappointed, to put it mildly.
- We're starting to use Intel/NT for other purposes, such as Intranet
Web serving and an off-the-shelf app based on MS SQL-Server.
And we use Compaq Proliants already as our Netware servers.
- There's a pretty strong MS bias in the company. Almost all of
our productivity software is MS.
I'm leaning strongly toward the Compaq box, but I'm worried about
running into the 'ceiling' on performance. At only $25,000, I
suspect I can afford to make that mistake ... once.
Any opinions on the validity of the points that I mentioned, or on
the choice that I'm making, would be GREATLY appreciated!
Thanks,
Barry Schader
Received on Thu Jan 16 1997 - 00:00:00 CST