Hi,
Bill Moran wrote:
We have some database servers that we're looking to replace with
beefier hardware, mainly because we're expecting our customer base
to grow a lot in the near future.
The current hw is Dell 2850 servers. These are dual proc (each proc
is hyperthreaded) with Dell PERC controllers driving 4 SCSI-320
disks in a RAID-10.
SCSI is really the minimum here.
We're considering two alternatives for the newer hardware:
1) Intel HT CPUs with 8M cache
2) Intel dual-core procs
Forget both. Opterons have a much better memory interface which helps
here a lot.
Our current Dells have 2M cache, and I'm trying to determine whether
the 8M cache will make a significant difference or not. Can someone
You have a simple problem. Even if you have a large cache, it has to be
refilled very often. The limited memory band with of Xeons will be of an
disadvantage here.
Take an Opteron motherboard where every CPU has its own memory slots.
Take the CPUs with the larger caches. Dual core plus at least two CPUs
help also.
recommend a testing procedure for determining whether adding cache is
worthwhile or not? I can simulate a test load at any time, but I
don't know how to tell whether the cache is the bottleneck of the
CPU or not.
You will never be able to answer this in general. I did some time ago
tests with Oracle running on a 24 CPU machine. There are situations
where most CPUs are idle because all CPUs work on locked parts off the
same table and there are situation where all 24 CPU are working on
different parts of the database bringing speed to extremely high levels.
As long as you do not know your future scenario and if you have the
money, get first the highest number of CPUs possible and add then dual
core if possible.
Erich
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