[olug] Specking out Sun Solaris box(es)

Mon Feb 17 22:10:15 UTC 2003

One thing to always keep in mind when building specs for a DB box: don't
skimp on disk i/o.

It sounds obvious but I've seen a lot of people overlook it for some
strange reason.  Extra CPUs cost a lot of money, and jump Oracle license
costs up at an alarming rate.  Extra disk I/O doesn't seem to cost near
as much as jumping up the CPU count because it doesn't up the ridiculous
per-CPU Oracle license costs.

I always shoot for 3 separate I/O chains for Oracle database boxes.  By
I/O chain I mean separate controller, separate disk, separate cabling, 
and if possible separate PCI bus.  One chain for database data, one
chain for database indexes, and the remaining chain to handle all O/S
partitions and also Oracle redo logging.  

Nick Walter

P.S. Avoid RAID-5 like the plague if performance matters.

On Mon, 2003-02-17 at 14:56, Matthew G. Marsh wrote:
> On Mon, 17 Feb 2003 IrishMASMS at olug.org wrote:
> 
> > > IrishMASMS wrote:
> > >> So, to those who are experienced with specking out sun systems my
> > >> quandary: is the SunBlate 150's good enough for our situation, or
> > >> should we go with something more? Something like a SunFire or
> > >> UltraSparc?
> > >>
> > >> Any & all comments would be appreciated
> > >
> > > Well, first off, they're all UltraSparcs :)  Perhaps you meant the Ultra
> > >  workstations and Enterprise servers...
> > >
> > > A SunFire is Sun's latest and greatest.  The V280R (dual processor -
> > > 900MHz, 8MB cache - FC disks) would be a good one.  Everything else
> > > starts at the $10k+ mark.  Some of the 1U rackmounts might be
> > > interesting, but suffer some of the problems as the SB150...
> > >
> > > A SunBlade 150 won't necessarily make a good server, and will most
> > > likely make for a slower database server than what you have now (not
> > > dual capable, small L2 cache for a Sun: only 256kb.  Most other Suns
> > > start at 1 or 2 MB ), and is IDE only.  It's also a pizza-box chassis,
> > > meaning running cables for any SCSI hard drives will be tough.
> > >
> > > You can see a picture of the insides here:
> > > http://sunsolve.sun.com/handbook_pub/Systems/SunBlade150/component.top.html
> > >
> > > A good choice would be one of these (probably what you were thinking
> > > when you said "UltraSparc"): the Ultra60 or Ultra80 (2-4 CPUs, tower
> > > chassis), E220R or E420R (same as Ultra60 or Ultra80 but with 19"
> > > rackmount chassis & redundant power), or E250 or E450 (deskside, 2-4
> > > CPUs, dual or triple power).  They all take UW, Ultra2 or Ultra-160 SCA
> > > disks (the bus is only UW).  All of these systems are available cheap on
> > >  the used market, with support contracts if you talk to the right
> > > people.
> 
> Second the Ultra{##} and Ex50 opinion. Definately lean on a SMP for the DB
> - Oracle (as with most DBs) has very good threading performance. Under
> sufficient memory conditions the threading alone will add perfomance under
> multiple connection opeations. FWIW NEbraskaCERT just bought an Ultra60
> used for $795 USD (dual 300Mhz / 512M / 9G) for the new database server
> for the websites and "other" work.
> 
> Since you are govm'NT can you obtain a "donation" of a to be retired
> system? I know there have been a bunch of E250's just pasturized.
> 
> > > --
> > >
> > > Phil Brutsche
> > > phil at brutsche.us
> > Thank you for the superb info Phil! Let me see if I can clarify the
> > situation a bit more.
> >
> > I am not sure what we mean; since I have never worked or specified Sun
> > equipment. This is why I turned to the fellow list members for assistance,
> > knowing full well there are a few smarter individuals out there than
> > myself on this topic (at least 8)!
> >
> > The first bit of research I conducted was try to find out what the other
> > organizations that use this system have in terms of hardware. The
> > information I was able to glean was that some sites were using SunFire
> > Servers, UltraSPARC® 900 MHz; and for what sites that reported memory
> > configurations they were between 1 GB to 8 GB.
> >
> > Discussing the issues with the database & system vendor, the system
> > implementation fellow said that a small sun box,(like a SunBlade 150)
> > would be good for our sized operation; although we might want to get two –
> > one for the database and system behind the firewall and the second on the
> > DMZ running the Apache web server interface for the customers.
> >
> > FWIIW, our database has around 31,0600 records, with anywhere between two
> > to ten staff members using the client software at any one time. I can say
> > that with our current configuration we have had some response issues when
> > four or five of us were interacting & manipulating the database through
> > the client software.
> > We do not have the web interface set up for our customers yet, so I am
> > unable to predict any usage that way.
> >
> > The current NT system does have two redundant 18 GB hard drives and a 4 MM
> > tape backup. Split into two partions, the 2 GB C: (system partioton) has
> > around 700 MB free and the 16 GB D: (database) has about 4.25 GB free.
> 
> One of the nice features of Sol8 at least is the software raid is actually
> easy to use and setup - and has held up under some of my torture tests
> (pulling drives out while running into swap...) very well. So with a
> couple of 36G or even 18G drives you can have nice redundancy. (personally
> I mirror everything...)
> 
> > Phil, I will go take a look at your recommendations; hopefully with the
> > further information I provided will help clarify our situation further.
> >
> > Unfortunately since this is a Government project, the used market is not
> > an option. Something to keep in mind for the future, outside projects
> > though!
> >
> > Support contracts are not an issue, if and when we migrate to Sun Solaris
> > platform the vendor assists with support.
> >
> >
> > Irish
> >
> >
> > <i>”An IT vision without funding is a hallucination.”</i>
> > Comment overheard by counterintelligence IT expert James Shinn, a fellow
> > with the Council on Foreign Relations, at a government IT conference held
> > by the Industry Advisory Council, an organization of IT professionals
> > (as reported in the November 11, 2002 issue of informationweek.com)
> 
> Heh - I wonder what the speaker thinks of Linux...
> 
> --------------------------------------------------
> Matthew G. Marsh,  President
> Paktronix Systems LLC
> 1506 North 59th Street
> Omaha  NE  68104
> Phone: (402) 932-7250
> Email: mgm at midwestlinux.com
> WWW:  http://www.midwestlinux.com
> --------------------------------------------------
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