[GENERAL] split up tables or one big one?

[Patrick Goodwill]

Hi!  

I'm writing a system which i could logically separate it into hundreds,
perhaps thousands, of tables, or it could put it all into one big table.  
Since each tables could probably only grow to 10s of MBs in size, from a
design, speed, and scalability perspective, is it perferable to split up
the tables (as I've currently programmed it) or to put everything into one
gigantic, multi-GB table?  This is for the web, so transaction speed is
important.

Patrick.