Don't forget the cpu cost. What is your cpuspeed? Using your data and a cpuspeed of 1000000000 to marginalize/eliminate the cpu cost factor I get: SNAME PNAME PVAL1 PVAL2 ------------------------------ ------------------------------ ---------- ------------------------------ SYSSTATS_INFO STATUS COMPLETED SYSSTATS_INFO DSTART 05-17-2005 17:15 SYSSTATS_INFO DSTOP 05-17-2005 17:15 SYSSTATS_INFO FLAGS 1 SYSSTATS_MAIN CPUSPEEDNW 400.897016 SYSSTATS_MAIN IOSEEKTIM 10 SYSSTATS_MAIN IOTFRSPEED 4096 SYSSTATS_MAIN SREADTIM 2 SYSSTATS_MAIN MREADTIM 16 SYSSTATS_MAIN CPUSPEED 1000000000 SYSSTATS_MAIN MBRC 128 SYSSTATS_MAIN MAXTHR SYSSTATS_MAIN SLAVETHR 13 rows selected. 17:15:53 ora101.scott> set autot traceonly explain 17:16:03 ora101.scott> select * from newkutro 17:16:16 2 / Execution Plan ---------------------------------------------------------- 0 SELECT STATEMENT Optimizer=ALL_ROWS (Cost=6251 Card=2000 Bytes=26000) 1 0 TABLE ACCESS (FULL) OF 'NEWKUTRO' (TABLE) (Cost=6251 Card=2000 Bytes=26000) exactly what is expected (because of _table_scan_cost_plus_one=TRUE). If I lower the cpuspeed to 1200, I get 17:21:07 ora101.scott> select * from newkutro; Execution Plan ---------------------------------------------------------- 0 SELECT STATEMENT Optimizer=ALL_ROWS (Cost=6548 Card=2000 Bytes=26000) 1 0 TABLE ACCESS (FULL) OF 'NEWKUTRO' (TABLE) (Cost=6548 Card=2000 Bytes=26000) Practically the same as you At 04:16 PM 5/17/2005, Christo Kutrovsky wrote: >100 000 / 128 * 16/2 =3D 6250 > >select * from newkutro > >reports a cost of 6549. > >Also by halfing MBRC almost doubles the cost. >By doubling SREADTIM it almost halves the cost, but by a different amount. Don't ignore the CPU cost "factor" - mathematically speaking not a factor but a summand. And it may not be fixed either, even for a fixed cpu speed. The estimated cpu cycles may be different for different # of estimated (physical) IO. >To me it doesnt make sense to check for mread > sread . opinions ? Whether it makes sense or not, that's the current rules. There are many more "sanity checks" and assumptions in the CBO, some of which I would question much more than this one. Regards Wolfgang Breitling Centrex Consulting Corporation http://www.centrexcc.com -- //www.freelists.org/webpage/oracle-l