terrible performance in 6.1beta4

[Norberto Meijome]

On Wed, 29 Mar 2006 19:09:26 -0600
Miguel <mmiranda at 123.com.sv> wrote:

> Hi, im loading a lot of information to a postgresql 8.1.3 database,
> im using the copy command, using the same file and version of
> postgres in gentoo it spend a few minutes (~4-5), in freebsd
> 6.1-beta4 it has already spent 25 minutes and the server apparently
> is doing nothing,

[...]

Hey Miguel,
I would agree with all the comments about memory and buffers - tweak
them till you allocate the right amount (i.e., make sure you don't OVER
allocate...though i'm sure you'd see those errors in the pgsql log.

what does ktrace show when you attach it to the process that is
importing the data (client and server processes,actually).

- have you tried doing a binary export and import? I've found them to
be faster, though they may not work for what you need (I think I'm
using them for backups... ). my hardware is pretty much the same as
yours, though 4 GB RAM and 4 drives., but my DB is somewhat larger

> and the reponse time of remote logins or running
> simple commands like ls -l /etc takes a lot of time (35 secs ort so),
> cpu usage is very low:

... and all these commands become responsive as usual the minute you
kill the import process?

btw, you definitely want to kill the indices / FKs in that table until
you're finished with the initial import - it'll speed things up a lot.

Beto