Re: Single-disk database and I/O load balancing?

"Geomancer" <pharfromhome_at_hotmail.com> wrote in message news:cf90fb89.0310100527.202279d8_at_posting.google.com...

> But what about smaller systems on a single, large disk?

Here is something I find hard to understand. M$ recommends AT LEAST 3disks as an absolute minimum for their SQL Server setup. And here we have sites making a case for 1 disk for Oracle. Why? At least 3 disks. Period.

> With the new 72 and 144 gig drives, it is hard to get my clients to
> buy extra disks when the existing disk is large enough to hold their
> entire database. These systems are always constrained by disk I/O.

Just tell them that M$ will not recommend anything less then 3, why are they asking you to do 1?

> So, is the idea of disk load-balancing truly a fraud for non-RAIDED
> disks?

Not at all. But there are some common misconceptions that should be addressed. Such as: why not have the implicitly cached dictionary tablespace live in the same logical spindle as the OS and software? It's not like it's gonna get a lot of I/O after the objects have been used for a while. So, put it where it won't hurt if something else uses up I/O capacity. And so on.

-- 
Cheers
Nuno Souto
wizofoz2k_at_yahoo.com.au.nospam