Re: Informix on NT platform - Impact of 100 to 400+ Users

Nils Myklebust <Nils.Myklebust@idg.no> wrote: > chaminda@jcdcrs4.jobcorps.org wrote: > First I am not an NT hater. We intend to use it as a database server. > However not in the league asked about by the original poster of this > thread. > Hopefully NT can make the Unix community understand that they must > leave their expert only attitude, and start making Unix simple to > manage and use. Some vendors are on their way down this road, but they > seem not to move to fast. > :Hi folks ! > : > :In the past few days,I've noticed a lot of negative talk about NT. MOst > :people have written saying how its not suitable for large networks. > No, for large databases with a large number of users. Of course that > implies a large network but that's not the key issue here. It can be > used in large networks with several servers where no large databases > with large number of users are involved. However it's well known that > these also impose management difficulties. Microsoft are hard at work > solving these (may be 4.0 is allready better than 3.x used to be). > :I'd like to know some facts, as to whats wrong with NT. Why doesn't it > :perform well in larger environments ? What features does it lack ? > It's a well known fact that NT version 3.51 didn't scale well beyond 4 > processors. More processors didn't give you much more performance. > Microsoft have done some changes to version 4.0. I don't know if they > help much. > The next problem is there aren't many machines available that can run > NT with more than 4 processors, naturally as it wasn't much use. > Compaq and others have now announced 8 processor machines using the > Corollary architecture for availability later this year. It remains to > be seen how well NT runs on these. The only machine that can come close to scaling NT above 4 cpus is a Sequent computer. Although the prefered (and even Sequent prefers it) OS is DYNIX/ptx, they also have the WinServer which runs NT. They have to install a VGA card so that it can run the console. You can cram in from 2 to 28 Pentium CPU's, 1GB of RAM, 1.6 terabytes of disk, (not all of the above at the same time), but as for the NT scaling that high, well... It is the most powerful NT server, but that is not saying much. I don't know if Informix supports it, either. I don't know or care how many users it can support. Sequent is now selling the Numa-Q architecture (Quad Pentium Pros). It cannot run NT yet (and may not ever, because they cannot scale NT that high). This is NOT in any way a recommendation, just information of existance. > Then if you need many disks what do you do. Each have a drive letter > between C and Z. What do you do when you need to add disk number 25? > (Yes, it's 100GB using 4GB disks, but that's not that large these > days.) I assume NT can span several disks and assign one drive letter > to it. How do you then control what chunk gets placed on what disk? > That's key to performance. > How about multiple disk controllers? How well does NT scale in this > area? > Do you know the security issues surrounding NT? Have they been > extensively tested, used and found good enough? There are still many > reports of problems in this area, although I don't know the details. > There are several other issues. The key is they must be cleared before > you attempt to push NT upward in a mission critical application. As > with other new techonolgy one starts out experimenting. Then some > smaller systems are implemented and used for some time. Bugs are > ironed out, problems are fixed and one can try a larger system. New > problems may pop up that need to be solved. This is an ongoing thing, > and NT simply hasn't come as far as beeing the platform for 100 - 400 > users and/or large data warehouse solutions. > :Do the problems stem from it being a database host or a network file > :server ? > The whole discussion has been only about NT as a database host. > Network file serving is another issue. > :How about a hybrid network with unix hosting the database & the network > :file server on NT ? > There is nothing wrong with that. On the contrary, most of the > arguments went on keeping the database on a Unix machine. The users > could still use MS Windows PC's. That's well known technology that can > scale both to very large databases and very large number of users. > It's also well known that Unix machines using NFS are not good file > servers for PC's. There are better soultions than NFS so Unix machines > can still be used, but NT is also a viable option for this purpose. > :Please try to list some hard facts . > I have. They are very well known though. That's the reason why I > didn't give them earlier. Microsoft knows about many of them, have > accepted them and are trying to solve them. We can't know how > successfull they will be until it's all tested in real life > situations. > :Thanks > : > :Chaminda Peries > Nils.Myklebust@idg.no > NM Data AS, P.O.Box 9090 Gronland, N-0133 Oslo, Norway > My opinions are those of my company > The Informix FAQ is at http://www.iiug.org -- Roger J. Allen Rush-Presbyterian-St. Luke's Medical Center System Administrator Chicago, IL USA Surgical Information Systems Voice: (312)-942-4825 Internet: rja@sis.rpslmc.edu FAX: (312)-942-3036