Actually, from some of my recent research into 64 bit
platforms, there might be some significant benefits from going to a 64 bit
platform (specifically the Opteron based, NOT the Intel EM64T based)
boxen.
Without going into a lengthy chip design discourse, the
memory access architecture and pipeline length differences of the architectures
make the Opteron a very compelling platform. The best metric I've seen to date
has been that the Opteron requires something like 225-250 clock cycles to fetch
data from RAM into the processor core, whereas the EM64T takes something like
450+ cycles. So even with a fully cached data base, you still have to deal
with very randomized access back to RAM due to the relatively scattered nature
of the data, you're going to see a very impressive performance gains. The memory
latency improvement alone should be significant.
That being said, resistance to change can be an issue - but
if you're able to do some comparisons, I'd bet you'll see a big improvement in
an Opteron DC over P4's.
Roger
--------
Roger Seielstad
E-mail Geek & MS-MVP
Roger Seielstad
E-mail Geek & MS-MVP
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Ayers, Diane
Sent: Tuesday, November 09, 2004 5:44 PM
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] 64 Bit?I think that I found my own answer while looking on. 64 bit seems to come into play with advanced memory utilization if your DITs are ~ 2GB in size. We don't fall into that category. I like the KISS approach and not introduce more OS versions to manage...Thanks all...Diane
From: Ayers, Diane [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Sent: Tuesday, November 09, 2004 7:05 AM
To: '[EMAIL PROTECTED]'
Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] 64 Bit?I guess my questions are general. I can see some advantages on shifting to a 64 bit platform for AD services but since the company I work for is definitely not bleeding edge, I was looking for what the general adoption rate of the 64 bit platform was. Our deployment can be considered (as compared to some of the more global deployments) some was centralized. Our DIT is ~ 1GB in size. The down side is that the "3rd party" tools and products have not really jumped on the 64 bit bandwagon yet.The main focus of my original question was more along the lines of whether other organizations had plans to shift to the 64 bit platform and when. If you've already shifted, what were some of the benefits and issues you saw.Diane
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Eric Fleischman
Sent: Monday, November 08, 2004 6:24 PM
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: RE: [ActiveDir] 64 Bit?I have worked with several environments that had 64bit DCs. All had DITs that were >=8GB in size.
What sorts of questions do you have?
~Eric
_____________________________________________
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] On Behalf Of Ayers, Diane
Sent: Monday, November 08, 2004 6:58 PM
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: [ActiveDir] 64 Bit?All:
Is anyone looking at using the 64 bit platform for their AD domain controllers? We're doing a life cycle replacement of our hardware next year and was wondering if anyone has gone down this path. I sat though some of the Web casts but is there anyone running 64 bit in the "real world" ;-)
Diane
