Re: RAC or Large SMP...?

<mccmx_at_hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:a41bd5b9-a91b-46d1-8283-c2bcfe1b4f28_at_i24g2000prf.googlegroups.com... On Oct 9, 11:35 am, "Bob Jones" <em..._at_me.not> wrote:
> <mc..._at_hotmail.com> wrote in message
>
> news:30456044-e3c2-457e-8165-2cabeedafe95_at_w13g2000prm.googlegroups.com...
>
> >> If you have your mind set on x86, I would suggest looking into IBM
> >> xSeries.
> >> They can scale way beyond 24 cores.- Hide quoted text -
>
> > Yeah x86_64 is the chosen platform.
>
> > I thought 24 cores was the limit for xSeries. How far can you go..?
>
> You can go further by combining multiple SMP boxes, 64 cores with the
> latest
> Intel.
>
> > I heard that the architecture of the high and IBM xSeries is NUMA
> > based (rather than SMP) and I was concerned at whether an Oracle
> > database with a large SGA would be able to scale on a NUMA based box
> > considering the relatively high latencies of non-local memory access.
>
> I think IBM would prefer not calling it NUMA because it implies slow
> memory
> access. The inter-module transfer rate is actually very fast, much faster
> than typical RAC interconnect. Unless your applications are well designed
> for RAC, I would recommend 2 large RAC nodes instead of many small ones.
>
> > Do you have any experience with Oracle on high end xSeries..?
>
> No, my high end systems are all non-x86. I am seriously looking into this
> option though.

> Cheers Bob, take a look at my response to Daniel earlier regarding
> multiple IBM x3850 chassis.

Ok, just be aware though, if you don't use RAC at all, it mean downtime if the node crashes. Received on Wed Oct 08 2008 - 20:45:43 CDT