Tuning for PostGreSQL Database

[Tom Samplonius]

On Sun, 20 Jul 2003, Sean Chittenden wrote:

> > > > 	FreeBSD 4.8 or 5.1?
> > > 
> > >   Probably 5.1-RELEASE.
> > 
> > I would recommend 4.8 over 5.1.  Especially if you intend this to be
> > a production server.  5.1 is not ready for public consumption.
> 
> Public consumption, yes.  Production consumption, no.
> 
> 5.1 is still pretty crippled in its current state because it's not
> Giant free yet.  Once Giant free, however, 5.X will be much closer to
> production ready and should be quicker as a result of the fine grained
> locking (or so everyone hopes).  The simple locking mechanism in 4.x

  Well, 5.1 is considerably less crippled by Giant than 4.8.  Well,
"crippled" is not a good description.  "Impaired" is better.  5.1 SMP
performance is less Giant impaired than 4.8.  That's a good thing.

> does have some advantages in cases and should be a consistent
> performer on UP machines and under most loads.... whether or not 5.x

  Giant is not present in a UP kernel.

  At the rate things are going, in a couple of years, most people are
going to using SMP, so UP is going to be less of an issue.

> over takes 4.X in terms of speed, is the subject of great debate, but
> many are optimistic that it will be at some point, just not at the
> moment.  5.X, will however (and without much doubt), scale much better
> than 4.X on multiple processor machines, though I'm not sure where
> that stands at the moment in terms of being completed and should
> likely be directed to current@ or questions@ instead of here.  -sc

  Yes, 5.1 is better on multiple CPUs.  So if 5.1 works for you, it is
going to work faster than 4.8 on SMP.

> -- 
> Sean Chittenden
> 
> 

Tom