>>>> >>>> set filesystemio_options = directIO and atime will not be >>>> updated...that is opne of the by-products of open with the >>>O_DIRECT >>>> flag. >>> >>>Yes but directio doesn't necessarily make Oracle IO faster. >>>A little bit more is needed. aio is a better bet. ..oh, async ? really? silly me. The post you are responding to had to do with Jared's point about atime updates. Async or not, direct I/O is what circumvents mtime/atime updates. BTW, neither direct, nor async make I/O "faster". The DMA transfer takes as long as the I/O subsystem will facilitate. However, direct and/or async usually handles the same amount of I/O with improved processor efficiency...and that, generally improves overall system throughput. Oracle Disk Manager is about the most efficient I/O library for Oracle...should be, Oracle defined the library...but I digress. I'm flashing back now..uh, right, it was 6.0.27 on Sequent DYNIX/ptx where we implemented direct+async I/O on filesystem files for the first time... ah, the good old days -- //www.freelists.org/webpage/oracle-l