oracle on NT vs Linux (intel)

Does anyone have any thoughts or performance statistics of Oracle 8.1.5 or 8.1.6 running on NT vs. Oracle 8.1.x running on Linux-RedHat-Intel? We're early in development on a project and don't have much budget to get high-end "server" machines. So what we have to work with are some very low-end machines, if you measure them as servers, but high-end if you measure them as user machines. We're talking 700mhz pentiums with 512 Megs of Ram with up to 4 HDs per machine.

Before I proceed, I should say that I certainly understand that it's not just the database that is responsible for performance and optimization and that the application development and design have as much, if not more responsibility. We have been taking the steps necessary to ensure a clean code implementation in the application side as well as employing logical and physical tuning strategies on the oracle side.

Having said that, the NT box seems sluggish when put under moderate stress. I say "moderate" only in regards to this NT box. (When all is said and done and this thing is deployed on real server hardware, this same level of activity will be miniscule).

The database is about 3GB right now. The largest table is about 2 million rows. Query performance is good. We've partioned the large tables and we keep the CBO stats current.

However, when we unleash our application on it which floods the database with a high number of concurrent transactions spread across multiple connections. (15 connections with will about 500 transactions per connection per minute SENT (via cached and perpared sql statements...so the database is literally being bombarded when this happens)...the NT machine is very sluggish and the transaction rate seems pretty low.

I can't really "blame" anyone simply because I don't know at what optimal level I can expect this hardware to perform at. (ultimately it's my expectations that are the problem)

But I'm wondering...I can't change the hardware (no budget), but, I can change the OS, linux the logical choice. Does anyone know if I can expect to see a difference? Any performance improvements? Perhaps performance degradation? Has anyone ever done an apples to apples comparison of Oracle on NT vs Oracle on Linux-Intel? Is there any information on the web anywhere that discusses this? Anything you wish to share is appreciated.

Thanks!

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http://www.keen.com Received on Fri Jul 14 2000 - 00:00:00 CDT