IDS on NT feasability

All, Without wanting to start a new OS war, please can i have your opinions (gut feel, etc): Do you think Windows NT is capable of handling a 50GB database with medium to low decision-support type queries from +- 150 clients connected via ODBC? Do you know of similar sized installations in the world, and which is the recommended version of Informix to use. TIA -- /* ----------------------------------------------------- * * Willem Roos wroos@shoprite.co.za * * roosj@mweb.co.za * * 0(+27)21 980 4941 * * 0(+27)21 919 0198 * * ----------------------------------------------------- */

This is an OLTP or DSS system? For a 50GB system, personally, I'd opt for some kind of UNIX. NT just chugs its heart out and as was mentioned, is more expensive the bigger it gets. Of course, you could pilot the system on both NT and a UNIX of some kind. IBM has good NT, in Netfinity. If it doesn't work on NT, they have Linux or AIX on Netfinity. The choices are numerous, but honestly, NT would be a last resort in my book, after exhausting everything. Another option is to cluster a small group of HP 9000's together, and build an Informix XPS cluster. The K-series of which the 9000 comes from were designed to cluster, and actually outperform the T-series. XPS of course is more designed for data warehousing, which is what it appears you are headed into. There are some really great OLAP tools now that work with XPS, it's worth a look from your local Informix rep. With XPS I'd highly recommend training as this is a race car, not a sedan. Tim Willem Roos wrote: > > All, > > Without wanting to start a new OS war, please can i have > your opinions (gut feel, etc): > > Do you think Windows NT is capable of handling a 50GB > database with medium to low decision-support type queries > from +- 150 clients connected via ODBC? Do you know of > similar sized installations in the world, and which is the > recommended version of Informix to use. > > TIA > -- > /* ----------------------------------------------------- * > * Willem Roos wroos@shoprite.co.za * > * roosj@mweb.co.za * > * 0(+27)21 980 4941 * > * 0(+27)21 919 0198 * > * ----------------------------------------------------- */ -- . .- .-- .--- .---- Tim Schaefer .----- tschaefe@bellsouth.net .---- http://www.inxutil.com .--- http://www.datad.com .-- .- .

Tim Schaefer <tschaefe@bellsouth.net> wrote: : This is an OLTP or DSS system? : For a 50GB system, personally, I'd opt for some kind of : UNIX. NT just chugs its heart out and as was mentioned, : is more expensive the bigger it gets. Of course, you I run DSS/OLTP systems of up to 200 gigabytes on various NT systems, with excellent performance on all of them. I've seen reliability comparable to UNIX systems. Although NT may lose out on perceived elegance features, I've been more than able to offset any OS performance issues by running it on a blazing-fast NT system. The 2-processor NetFinity systems are killer boxes. In my last install, the DW folks running on UNIX boxes expressed envy over the NT system's performance. Joe -- --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Joe Lumbley(jlumbley@netcom.com) author of: "INFORMIX DBA Survival Guide" The DBA Survival Guide, Second Edition covers NT, 7.X through 7.3, http://www.dbasurvivalguide.com ---------------------------------------------------------------------------

Joe Lumbley wrote: > > Tim Schaefer <tschaefe@bellsouth.net> wrote: > : This is an OLTP or DSS system? > > : For a 50GB system, personally, I'd opt for some kind of > : UNIX. NT just chugs its heart out and as was mentioned, > : is more expensive the bigger it gets. Of course, you > > I run DSS/OLTP systems of up to 200 gigabytes on various NT systems, with > excellent performance on all of them. What do you define as "excellent" performance? > I've seen reliability comparable > to UNIX systems. While you may have seen this, I wouldn't trust a production system on NT, especially the upcoming Windows 2000 release, which is buggy as ever. Everywhere I turn to in research about MS and NT, I find a scary future with this operating system. I wouldn't bet on it for anything serious, much less the talent needed to run it is usually a person with no background other than NT. This is below par. NT is just MS-DOS, and hardly an operating system. > Although NT may lose out on perceived elegance features, > I've been more than able to offset any OS performance issues by running > it on a blazing-fast NT system. The 2-processor NetFinity systems are > killer boxes. > Oh sure they are. Nothing wrong with buying NT, but it has been my experience that in order to do anything with NT you practically have to sit at the console to manage it, and add-ons to do remote management pale in comparison to what's available for UNIX and of course Linux. For example, I can manage a UNIX box completely from a web browser, to wit WebMin. Sorry I don't have the URL handy, but it's a great tool to admin a box, and even allows you an SSL connection to a *NIX box. All the ports on the box can be shut off except for one connection to webmin, and it runs its own httpd daemon, to allow you to practically start/stop a box remotely without having to use telnet, or allow ftp port exposure. NT will never be able to do this kind of thing because NT depends too much on its own GUI. From a performance perspective I would be highly skeptical of any claims that NT is some kind of high-performance system, unless you throw lots of hardware at it, in most cases more than you'd have to use for UNIX. The work-around factor for NT to do what is so simple in UNIX astounds me, especially when people consider NT for an OS over UNIX. > In my last install, the DW folks running on UNIX boxes expressed envy over > the NT system's performance. > Sure they did. If they were running some kind of pooch UNIX system and you compared that with a newer NT system, anything is possible. :-) It's my understanding that benchmarks will be forthcoming again very soon for Informix on Linux, and some of the other UNIXes. After that we'll have another chat. > Joe > -- > --------------------------------------------------------------------------- > Joe Lumbley(jlumbley@netcom.com) author of: "INFORMIX DBA Survival Guide" > The DBA Survival Guide, Second Edition covers NT, 7.X through 7.3, > http://www.dbasurvivalguide.com > --------------------------------------------------------------------------- -- . .- .-- .--- .---- Tim Schaefer .----- tschaefe@bellsouth.net .---- http://www.inxutil.com .--- http://www.datad.com .-- .- .