QUESTION: Oracle Pricing

From: Shannon Thornton <thornton_at_icchip.wes.army.mil>
Date: 1997/02/10
Message-ID: <32FF7146.3DFB@icchip.wes.army.mil>#1/1

I'm trying to setup a web site using Oracle's Webserver and DBMS v7.x. I'm going to put it on a Sun3000. I called Oracle and talked to their Govt rep who asked for the following:

Machine type
Number of concurrent users (for the database)

They quoted me $2495 for the Webserver and the DBMS depends on the number of concurrent users. What is a normal answer for this question? It seems somewhat absurd to me b/c it's a web application. I will use authentication to restrict access, but with that, I still will have 200 - 1500 users per server. The odds on all of them being on-line at the same time is very remote, but what number do you tell Oracle so they can quote you a price. The info I got from the Oracle rep was the following:

32 users per cpu Enterprise @ $1329 per user
20 users per cpu Worker @ $415 per user

Suppose my Sun has 2 cpus and I want to support 100 users. Does this mean it is not possible? She talked like I could only go in increments of 32 users per cpu. That doesn't make sense. On a fast enough machine, I should be able to support 50-100 users per cpu.

This is the first time I've tried to price out a setup for a server. Some of this seems odd to me. I'm looking for info/advice from other folks who have done this before.

Thanks.

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: Shannon Thornton                       : U.S. Army Corps of Engineers
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: InterNet: thornton_at_icchip.wes.army.mil : Waterways Experiment Station
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: #include <std.disclaimer>              :           Computer Scientist

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+-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-+ Received on Mon Feb 10 1997 - 00:00:00 CST