Re: running big oracle dbms, on what kind of hardware?

Bastorff wrote:

> Anyone running fairly "big" databases (ok, pretty huge where
> I come from anyway :-)) , say 40-60GB?
> What hardware/cpu is capable of running such a beast?
>
> I'm looking for experienced comments on suitable and
> comparable systems... Right now I'm thinking AlphaServer DS20E
> box, but instead of blindly going by SPEC numbers and thelike,
> I'd be glad to hear from you (instead of salespitch)! For
> instance, what SUN cpu box could do the job? Of course, I/O
> subsystem and network comes in to play but that's for later...
>
> Regards,
> /fad
>
>

        The minimum size of your system depends on the nature of your appllication (OLAP vs OLTP), the number of users, and the amount of activity.

        The size of the database should not be one of the metrics used to select a hardware/OS configuration.

        I have seen applications where a 100Mhz Pentium was able to handle a 50GB database and, on the other hand, I have seen a smaller database with a high enough transaction rate to bury a two processor HP-9000 K series system.

        My current thinking is given the cost of Oracle and the cost of developing the application the cost of the processor and RAM isn't consequential and the cost to administer a Unix system is no greater than the cost to administer an NT or WIN2000 system doing comparable work. Therefore I would go with a Sun box with lots and lots of RAM a lot of disk drives and the ability to support four processors. If the price differential between two and four processors is less than 20% just go with four processors to begin with, otherwise go with two.

-- 
Jerry Gitomer
Once I learned how to spell DBA, I became one