Re: Informix vs. Sybase vs. Oracle vs. (gasp) MS SQL Server

Steve Phelan wrote:
>
> Reid Fleming wrote:
>
> > Larry Stephenson <larrst_at_digital.net> wrote:
> >
> > >
> > >Igor Chudov _at_ home wrote:
> > >>
> > >> Hello,
> > >>
> > >> I have been asked to do a comparison of captioned database
 engines,
> > >> to choose a database server for a medium size database (less than
 2GB,
> > >> about 60-100 tables).
> > >>
> > >> I would appreciate both pointers to professionally done
 comparisons, as
> > >> well as your personal opinions on performance and reliabiilty of
 these
> > >> systems.
> > >>
> > >> There is a special emphasis made on reliability, so your accounts
 of
> > >> problems and crashes will be much appreciated. Oh yes, the
 hardware
> > >> will likely be Sun or IBM RS6000.
> > >>
> > >> Thank you.
> > >>
> > >> igor
> > >
> > I've worked with all three. IMHO, they each have their own points:
> >
> > Sybase - great environment for administering or developing. The
> > weakest point was its 'page-level locking'. That means that if you
> > have a lot of users trying to get at the same tables, you'll often
> > have users locked out. If they got this problem fixed, I'd
> > recommend
> > it the most.
> >
> > Informix - great use of processing power on SMP computers. Fast
> > loads and indexing, and the OLTP seems to function well. I really
> > liked the stability and reliability as well. I recommend this
> > database be used for your situation.
> >
> > Oracle - lots of people use this. It has some strengths, such as
> > row level locking, but the environment for developers and
> > administrators are a little kludgy. It doesn't have some utilities
> > found in Informix or Sybase, like a fast 'unload' utility for
> > getting
> > data out of tables. ( I hear there are some third party products
> > that
> > will do this). Overall very solid performance....just needs a few
> > more bells and whistles.
> >
> > By the way, I'd highly recommend that you go with Suns over the
> > RS6000. I've had experience with these databases on the RS6000's,
> > the Sun servers, and HP 9000's. You really need a box that's more
> > scalable than the RS6000 if you think of increasing your DB size or
> > the number of users. The multi-machine approach that IBM takes
> > to scalability does not work as well as a big, single box that can
> > take up to 12 processors. I think the databases are just not
> > written
> > in a way that take advantage of them.
> >
> > Hope this helps
>
> Not quite sure what you mean by 'The multi-machine approach that IBM
> takes
> to scalability does not work as well as a big, single box that can
> take up to 12 processors. I think the databases are just not written
> in a way that take advantage of them.'?
>
> The IBM RS6000 J30 and R30 models can take 2, 4, 6 or 8 processors in an
> SMP environment which Oracle 7 will fully exploit. How would an Sun or
> HP SMP server differ?
>

Well

1. The CPU's in the J40 and the R40 are arround half the performance of the CPU's in a Sun EX000 or a HP.
2. You can have up to 64 CPU's in a Sun, though this is probably more then he needs :)

Regards

Andrew Harrison
Senior Consultant SunUK Received on Tue Apr 15 1997 - 00:00:00 CEST