Re: Restricting Oracle to one processor
- From: "Jared Still" <jkstill@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: piontekdd@xxxxxxxxx
- Date: Thu, 12 Jun 2008 16:04:31 -0700
There's only one way to find out for sure.
Ask a sales rep to price it for you.
Everything else is just guesswork.
On Thu, Jun 12, 2008 at 12:30 PM, Bradd Piontek <piontekdd@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> In lieu of my finding a licensing expert, I am a bit troubled by this
> discussion. Maybe perplexed is a better term. I have read through the Global
> Price List, read the terms, read the Software Investment Guide, and I'm
> still confused on Standard Edition.
>
> Oracle gives good Enterprise, multi-core examples, but not very good one's
> for Standard (on purpose? :) ). So here's a real-world example.
>
> Let's say I'm going to buy a Sun T5220 (T2 chipset, 4 or 8 core). I have no
> need for any of the enterprise options and would like to run standard
> edition on this server. Is that even possible? I"m not sure how the T2
> chipset is laid out. My first thought was to say 'yes', it has one socket
> and therefore is eligible. If I take the sticter view of the multi-chip
> module, I may tend to think that a 4-core T2 could run Standard (4 sockets)
> but the 8-core could not. Anyone have any insight to this specific example?
> --
> Bradd Piontek
> http://www.twitter.com/piontekdd
>
>
> On Fri, Jun 6, 2008 at 11:55 PM, Mark Brinsmead <
> pythianbrinsmead@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
>> Jason,
>>
>> Sorry. I did not read closely enough the first time. I think I see
>> now what is confusing you...
>>
>> *> A multi-core processor is still just one chip,*
>>
>> No. This is not correct. An Intel Quad-Core processor has (for now) *
>> two* processor chips, each with one core. AMD quad-core processors have
>> all processing units on one chip. For now. Three years from now, who knows
>> what they might be marketing?
>>
>> Multi-core processors may, in fact, be implemented with any number of
>> processor chips. I recall an announcement from Sun Microsystems a while
>> back that could actually allow a *single* processor core to be
>> implemented with *multiple* chips, although I doubt anybody would ever
>> choose to do that.
>>
>> *> so my understanding of the "multi-chip module" wording would be
>> something like a daughtercard with multiple processors on it.*
>>
>> That is *one* form that a MCM can take, but there are many others.
>> Often, MCMs will appear as a small square or rectangle of fibre-glass
>> circuit card, with a metal cap on top. Beneath the metal cap, there are
>> multiple chips. As packaging technology has improved, MCMs can now appear
>> as multiple chips embedded in ceramic or -- I expect -- even the "black goo"
>> that has commonly been used to package single chips.
>>
>> The early MCMs from Intel (e.g., Pentium-II processors) looked very much
>> like you describe -- a "card" mounted vertically in a "slot". But they now
>> commonly appear as the standard pin-grid-array packages that most of of
>> think of when we picture a "CPU" or a "chip". I suspect that you will find
>> -- if you dig deeply enough -- that *most* modern CPUs are actually
>> delivered as multi-chip-modules. I could be mistaken about that, though.
>>
>> By the way... What is a "chip"? Most people picture a black oblong with
>> little metal legs on the side or a big grid of pins on the bottom when the
>> envision a "chip". This is not correct. A chip is a (usually) oblong piece
>> of (usually) silicon crystal, with integrated circuits etched on its
>> surface. One or more of these "chips" go into one of those black oblong
>> things (called "packages") with those legs or pins. When a package contains
>> more than one "chip", we call it a multi-chip-module.
>>
>> *> One motherboard socket, but multiple physical CPUs. *
>>
>> Actually, most MCMs contain *only one* CPU chip, but may contain memory
>> controllers, memory chips, GPUs, and many other things. Under the new
>> licensing rules, every one of those chips now counts as a "occupied socket",
>> that is a "CPU", for licensing purposes.
>>
>> *> However, if you were going to purchase SE or SE1 licenses, I would
>> definitely ask a licensing expert to be sure.*
>>
>> Yes, you should! But be *certain *when you are consulting an "expert"
>> that they actually (fully) understand what a Multi-Chip-Module is! (Note:
>> your Oracle sales rep probably does not...)
>>
>>
>>
>>
> <http://www.last.fm/user/piontekdd/>
>
--
Jared Still
Certifiable Oracle DBA and Part Time Perl Evangelist
Other related posts:
